The Royal Scottish National Orchestra is one of Europe's leading symphony orchestras. Formed in 1891 as the Scottish Orchestra, the company became the Scottish National Orchestra in 1950, and was awarded Royal Patronage in 1977. Many renowned conductors have contributed to its success, including Sir John Barbirolli, Walter Susskind, Sir Alexander Gibson, Neeme Järvi, Walter Weller, Alexander Lazarev and Stéphane Denève.

The Orchestra’s artistic team is led by Danish conductor Thomas Søndergård, who was appointed RSNO Music Director in 2018. The RSNO is supported by the Scottish Government and is one of the Scottish National Performing Companies. The Orchestra performs across Scotland, including concerts in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Aberdeen, Perth and Inverness and appears regularly at the Edinburgh International Festival and the BBC Proms. The RSNO has made recent tours to the USA, China and Europe.

The RSNO has a worldwide reputation for the quality of its recordings, receiving a 2020 Gramophone Classical Music Award for Chopin’s Piano Concertos (soloist: Benjamin Grosvenor), conducted by Elim Chan, two Diapason d’or awards (Denève/Roussel 2007; Denève/Debussy 2012) and eight GRAMMY Award nominations. Over 200 releases are available, including Thomas Søndergård conducting Strauss (Ein Heldenleben, Der Rosenkavalier Suite) and Prokofiev (Symphonies Nos.1 &5), two discs of African American Voices featuring the music of George Walker, William Levi Dawson, Margaret Bonds and more, conducted by Kellen Gray; the complete symphonies of Sibelius (Gibson), Prokofiev (Järvi), Bruckner (Tintner) and Roussel (Denève), as well as further discs championing the music of William Grant Still (Eisenberg), Xiaogang Ye (Serebrier) and Thomas Wilson (Macdonald).

The RSNO’s Engagement strategy, Music for Life, sees the Orchestra work with schools and community groups, connecting its music with the people of Scotland. Since March 2020, the RSNO has created multiple online Engagement programmes and Digital Seasons, ensuring the RSNO continues to bring world-class music to its audiences in Scotland and around the world on stage and on screen.

Patrick Hahn

Conductor, composer and pianist Patrick Hahn was born in 1995 in Graz, Austria and has already established himself as one of the most promising artists of his generation. Patrick’s international presence has grown exponentially in recent seasons in both the concert hall and opera house, with important engagements including dates with the Münchner Philharmoniker, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, Wiener Symphoniker and Bayerische Staatsoper.  From the season 2021/22 he has taken up the position of General Music Director of the Wuppertaler Bühnen und Sinfonieorchester GmbH, becoming the youngest GMD in Germany.

As conductor, he has performed with major orchestras and opera houses including the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Choir, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, DSO - Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra, NDR Radiophilharmonie, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Tonkünstler Orchestra Niederösterreich, Camerata Salzburg, Lucerne Symphony Orchestra, as well as Dutch National Opera, Bavarian State Opera Munich, and Frankfurt Opera. From 2021 until 2023 he has served as Principal Guest Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Borusan İstanbul Philharmonic Orchestra. Within the field of contemporary music he has a close relationship with Klangforum Wien.

As a pianist, he performed with the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg or as a Lied accompanist in the Vienna Musikverein.

Next to his studies in piano and conducting at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, he was invited to master classes with Kurt Masur, Bernard Haitink, and as a Conducting Fellow to the Aspen Music Festival and the Tanglewood Music Center.

Patrick’s first composition was an opera, Die Frittatensuppe, which he premiered in 2008. In 2013 he was awarded the 2nd prize from 170 submissions worldwide for his composition Ameraustrica at the 2013 Penfield Music Commission Project Contest (New York, USA). As a composer and arranger he has published music with Tierolff Muziekcentrale (Roosendaal, The Netherlands) as well as Helbling (Innsbruck, Austria).

Aside from his work in classical music, Patrick has a keen interest in both cabaret-songs, by the Austrian satirist and composer Georg Kreisler, as well as in jazz music, having received awards as a pianist at jazz festivals such as Chicago, and the ‘Outstanding Soloist Award’ from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse as the best jazz pianist of the 37th Annual Jazz Festival.