The Edinburgh Festival will incorporate a strand of contemporary music in 2018, with the likes of Mogwai and Django Django appearing alongside John Grant and St. Vincent.

The International Festival returns to Leith Theatre, for the first time in 30 years, for a special season called Light on the Shore. Karine Polwart will also play a show at the revamped venue, on the 18th, as will King Creosote on the 9th, while Anna Meredith performs her SAY Award-winning album ‘Varmints’ with the Southbank Sinfonia on August 11th.

There will be two Mogwai shows at the theqtre, on the 22nd and 23rd August.

Also, Berlin-based Stargaze Ensemble rework Boards of Canada’s ‘High Scores’, while Lau – Kris Drever, Martin Green and Aidan O’Rourke – plus promoters Neu! Reekie!, Hidden Door, and Celtic Connections, will curate bespoke events.

The full line-up plus ticket information will be announced on May 2nd 2018.
Also announced are John Grant, trailing his new album, due for release in August, and St. Vincent.

In the non-indie (and non-Leith) section of the festival programme, Sir Simon Rattle and the Oslo Philharmonic are among the big names announced for far, while Leonard Bernstein is celebrated across a series of concerts around his birthday on 25 August.

Also, The Hebrides Ensemble gives a recital at The Queen’s Hall featuring a number of Bernstein’s chamber music works, and at the Usher Hall feature his former pupil and protégé, conductor Marin Alsop, leading Nicola Benedetti and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra through some of his most acclaimed works, including the Serenade and Symphonic Dances from West Side Story.

More at the EIF website.