Donnerstags-Abschied: 2026 East Neuk Festival plans tribute to the late John Wallace with a work he wanted to bring to the festival but never achieved

John Wallace in rehearsals for ThunderPlump (East Neuk Festival Big Project 2022) with a young performer from StAMP (Photo: Neil Hanna)

The trumpeter John Wallace, who died in January this year, was born in Fife and his father played in the Tullis Russell Mills Band for 65 years with Wallace quickly joining the junior band. Wallace remained proud of his Fife roots and a vital participant in musical life in the Kingdom of Fife. He instigated multiple community orientated projects including StAMP, the University of St Andrews’ outreach programme.

StAMP has been a regular collaborator of the East Neuk Festival for many years, whilst Wallace took a leading role on three of the Festivals ‘Big Projects’ which brought together professional and community musicians as part of the main festival programme. These included the award-winning De Profundis which Wallace wrote with McEwan-Brown in 2017, to celebrate the lives of Fife’s miners and bring together massed brass bands, alongside Wallace’s own ensemble The Wallace Collection.

One project that Wallace discussed more than once (but never achieved) with Festival Artistic Director Svend McEwan-Brown was a performance of Stockhausen’s five-trumpet Donnerstags-Abschied written for the end of Stockhausen’s opera Donnerstag aus Licht. 

This year’s East Neuk Festival, which runs from 1 to 5 July 2026 will feature two performances of Stockhausen’s  Donnerstags-Abschied with Marco Blaauw leading an ensemble formed of John Wallace’s friends and colleagues. Weather permitting it will be performed outdoors at sunset on Saturday 4 July, and indoors preceding the closing concert on Sunday 5 July.

Another proud son of Fife is celebrated in Looking for Oswald, exploring the life and music of James Oswald, the 18th century composer who was born in Crail. The event mixes words from Tom Davison (who has written a book about Oswald) with music from Karen Marshalsay, harps, Kathryn Nicholl, fiddle, Chris Miles, voice.

The festival opens with an intriguing concert when Scotland’s finest jazz pianist Fergus McCreadie will play Brahms’ Four Ballades, Op. 10 before taking these as inspiration for his own improvisations plus duos and trios with Su-a Lee (cello) and Donald Grant (violin).

There are three quartets at the festival, Opus13, Cuarteto Quiroga, Calidore Quartet and the three will share out Beethoven’s Razumovsky Quartets and spread performances across the Saturday. Alongside thise, Cuarteto Quiroga is joined by Christian Zacharias for Schubert’s Trout Quintet, Opus 13 quartet play Images from the Floating World, a piece by Swedish composer Britta Byström inspired by Njál’s Saga, and Calidore Quartet perform Arietta, a work by Mark-Anthony Turnage inspired by Beethoven’s late piano sonatas.

Other music includes Llŷr Williams performing Schumann’s Kreisleriana, the Tallis Scholars in all three Byrd masses, and the festival ends with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Maxim Emelyanchev in Mozart, Haydn and Stravinsky including ‘No word from Tom’ (from The Rake’s Progress) with soprano Anna Dennis.

Other visitors to the festival include Kolektif Istanbul, a traditional Turkish wedding band, oud player Rihab Azar who is joined by Scottish fiddle player Donald Grant, Scottish/Egyptian music from the Ayoub sisters, and English Concert Winds in Mozart serenades.

Full details from the festival’s website.