The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra will mark the first day of Pride Month with Symphonic Pride: We Have Always Been Here – the first Pride-themed concert by a professional orchestra in Scotland.
The event will celebrate LGBTQ+ artists whose creativity has shaped orchestral music across centuries.
Orchestral classics revisited
On Wednesday 22 July 2026 (7.30pm) at Glasgow City Halls, this landmark event – the first Pride-themed concert by a professional orchestra in Scotland – moves between big-hearted orchestral classics and bold new expressions from the 21st-century.
From the pulse-raising Romantic intensity of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake to a full-orchestra Pink Pony Club moment, it’s a ride through big feelings, bigger personalities, and unapologetically expressive symphonic music.
At the concert’s heart is Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake – arguably the most famous ballet score ever written – whose themes of hidden identity and impossible love continue to resonate with the LGBTQ+ community today.
No Pride celebration would be complete without a moment of pure, unrestrained joy. Audiences will be sent off into the night with one question definitively answered.
Yes, Chappell Roan’s Pink Pony Club sounds even better with a full symphony orchestra behind it. Glittery, euphoric and completely over the top!
Conductor, Jessica Cottis, said: “I’m so excited to be on the BBC SSO podium for this uplifting celebration of identity and belonging, and to be back in the city where I began my conducting career and first worked with this trailblazing orchestra.
“Our programme brings together familiar music heard afresh alongside powerful new compositions, each with its own inspiring story of resilience and celebration. It’s going to be bold, vibrant and impossible not to enjoy!”