RSNO chamber musicians play Bartók, Beethoven and Brahms

In one of Europe’s hottest capitals (that day), a sizeable Edinburgh crowd gathered in the shade of the Dovecot Studios for this season’s final RSNO chamber concert.

It was the first time I'd been fully clothed in this venue. Prior to its 2008 reinvention, Dovecot Studios was the oldest of Edinburgh's six Victorian swimming pools. Now a tapestry studio and exhibition space, it doubles as a resonant chamber music venue. The musicians occupied the shallow end, amply lit by bright Edinburgh skies through the lengthy cupola.

The young Spanish violinist proves an ardent advocate for a work originally dismissed as a “Hollywood Concerto” as the BBC Symphony Orchestra closes its Barbican season.

Come away fellow sailors, your anchors be weighing! All board the Cutty Sark for a semi-staging of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas with the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists.

Late Brahms, early Schoenberg: under Lahav Shani and the Rotterdam Philharmonic draw tenderness from two monumental scores. 

Songs and symphonies from Sir Simon Rattle and the London Symphony Orchestra, concluding with a vision of “heavenly life” from Gustav Mahler.