Part of the Royal Company of Merchants involvement in the Edinburgh 900 celebrations is a choral and orchestral concert by pupils at ESMS, one of the Merchant Company schools, in the magnificent and iconic Usher Hall in Lothian Road on Sunday 23rd March 2025.
A particular highlight of the concert will be three specially commissioned compositions to celebrate the Edinburgh 900 initiative. Renowned Edinburgh author Alexander McCall Smith has written three texts which have been set to music by Edinburgh City Organist, John Kitchen. They will be given their first performance in the concert by a choir of ESMS pupils from Primary 6 to S2. The songs celebrate the Scottish Enlightenment, Edinburgh as a Festival City and the Old Town pre-enlightenment practice of ‘Gardyloo!’
The concert will also include concerto performances by two talented ESMS S6 pupils. James Page will perform Kol Nidrei by Max Bruch and Alexey Popov will perform the first movement of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto, both accompanied by the Schools’ Symphony Orchestra, and will bring S3 to S6 pupils together with the ESMS Community Choir to perform William Walton’s Coronation Te Deum and a setting of the same text by Haydn.
Booking details are to be confirmed.
ESMS is a vibrant, family of schools for 3-18 year olds located in the heart of Edinburgh. It is deeply rooted in the heart of Edinburgh’s educational heritage and is proud to be a part of the historic Edinburgh 900 celebrations. With a history dating back over 300 years, ESMS is the story of three different benefactors, from contrasting periods of Scotland’s history. In 1694, the Scottish businesswoman and philanthropist Mary Erskine founded the girls’ school that would bear her name, in partnership with the Merchant Company. Melville College was founded in 1832 and Daniel Stewart’s College in 1855. The three institutions came together in the 1970s and by the turn of the 21st century they had developed into the largest family of independent schools in Europe. ESMS has never been a school that stands still and from August 2026 the three schools will unite to become one fully co-educational school named Erskine Stewart Melville.
