Edinburgh Culture Minute 🪩 28 Oct - 3 Nov 2026
Meet the city's top 32 creatives, uni experts unite on why AI data centres are NOT inevitable, stellar gig for Gaza + this week's cultural jobs
👋 Welcome to the 147th weekly Culture Minute: a round-up of Edinburgh’s local creative news, events, jobs and opportunities. If I’ve missed anything please get in touch. Thanks to everyone who contributes!
👀 Most-viewed links from the previous Edinburgh Culture Minute:
- 🎨 Nearly 10,000 sign 'Save Summerhall' petition. [1,600 clicks]
- 📆 Fringe organisers consider changing festival dates.
- 🎸 Sam Fender announces Murrayfield stadium gig, on sale Friday.
- 📚 Pentlands Book Festival programme (on now until 25 Nov).
- 📆 Arts 'crisis' meeting for Summerhall (1.30pm Sunday 1 Nov).
🗞️ News
🏆 Whittled down from 140 nominations from across the city's creative community, 32 individuals, organisations and projects have made the shortlist for the 15th annual Creative Edinburgh Awards. Here they are, across eight categories:
Community Award: Pianodrome, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Screen Education Edinburgh, Summerhall Arts.
Inclusion Award: Edinburgh Community Performing Arts, HIV Aloud: Raise the Curtain with Edinburgh Playhouse and Waverley Care, Out of Sight Out of Mind Exhibition, Screen Education Edinburgh.
Collaboration Award: Dementia-Friendly Workshops with Space Beacon Club and Edinburgh International Festival, HIV Aloud: Raise the Curtain with Edinburgh Playhouse and Waverley Care, Manipulate Arts & WHALE Arts - Ocho Project, Starcatchers Productions Ltd.
Development Award: Darren Wilkie, Fiona Linton, Hannah Ayre, Rachel Barlow.
Festivals Award - Sponsored by The List: Edinburgh Art Festival, Hidden Door, Manipulate Festival, Summerhall Arts.
Innovation Award: Heads on Crooked, The Pend, Trevor Jones, Where Are The Disabled Photographers?.
Leadership Award - Sponsored by Screen Scotland: Jess Abrams - Lecturer in Community Music at Edinburgh College, Kat Brooks - Leader of The Phoenix Choir, Susie Gray - Executive Director of Premier Scotland, Suzanne Lofthus - Artistic Director of Cutting Edge Theatre.
Student Awards: Floria Paul, The Edinburgh College Game Society, Romana Docherty, Lok Pui Lo.
Congratulations to all nominees. I strongly urge anyone who reads the Culture Minute to go along to the awards ceremony on Friday 13 November at Central Hall in Tollcross. This is the third year in a row that the Minute has proudly sponsored it. It's one of the best nights of the year and full of inspiring stories from wonderful people doing brilliant things. You'll come away from the event full of renewed creative enthusiasm. If you feel you're lacking a sense of community or want to make some new pals, it's the ideal opportunity to meet some good folks too. - Tickets are here.
🏢 Some of the 100+ creative tenants from St Margaret's House will be speaking at tomorrow's City of Edinburgh Council meeting to make the case for delaying their eviction. - Illustrator Maria Stoian shares more details in this post.
🎟️ Big tickets this week
🪫 My event of the week is: Fighting the "Inevitable": AI, Hyperscale Datacentres, and Resistance. - 6 November at Assembly Roxy, tickets via Lighthouse Bookshop. The description:
"AI is inevitable.” This message rings out from our phones, our bosses, our politicians, and is used to justify the build-out of hyperscale datacentres, new surveillance technologies, and job cuts. This panel challenges that assumption, unpacking the negative impacts of datacentres, unjust power dynamics of many AI models, and celebrating the resistance which brings power back to communities. Can we envision an alternative future in the face of this fast-moving technology? This panel is sponsored and organised by People and Planet at University of Edinburgh. Speakers: Dr Victoria Plutshack, Steph Wright, Dr Rupert Nash, Kim Pratt, chaired by Anna Komendantskaya.
🎵 Some of Scotland’s most acclaimed musicians play on The Queen's Hall stage to raise their voices and critical funds for people suffering under siege in Gaza. A Night for MAP (Medical Aid for Palestinians) features: Aidan O’Rourke with Graeme Stephen, Dean Owens, Harben Kay with Stephen Henderson, Beth Malcolm, Iain Morrison, Cahalen Morrison and Kathleen Macinnes, with speaker Humza Yousaf. It's on Thursday 12 November and tickets are here.
🎺 The next Shore Leave event at Brown's of Leith will feature Chris Greive on trombone and Graeme Stephen on guitar, long-time collaborators in performance, composition and improvisation. Tuesday 24 November. - Tickets here.
🏰 Just announced: celebrating 15 years in music, Olly Murs will play Edinburgh Castle on Friday 16 July 2027. - Tickets on sale from 10am on Friday.
🎸 Playing new stuff and the classics, Kyle Falconer of The View is playing Cab Vol on Thursday night. - Tickets.
👀 If this edition is too long and gets cut off in your inbox, read it online here.
🎭 What's on Edinburgh's stages this week?
⭐️ Here's Thom Dibdin of All Edinburgh Theatre:
It's a week of big shows on the big stages and of big showings on the wee stages. Such a big week all round but you won't get in to see it all, no matter how you divvy up your timetable.
If you've not got a ticket you’ll not likely get into the biggest show in town, at the Traverse, where Tilda Swinton returns to the live theatre stage in a revival of the 1987 production of Man to Man (Thur-Sat 7 Nov: returns only).
The biggest subject of the two musicals in town is in Rollers Forever at the King's (ends Sat: tickets), the nostalgic look back at Roller-mania, with big hits and big laughs a-plenty. But arguably the bigger show is Dirty Dancing, having the time of its life as it returns to the Playhouse (ends Sat: tickets).
Winston is not having the time of his life in the Scottish co-pro of 1984 at the Lyceum (ends Sat 7 Nov: tickets): a powerful and horribly relevant new adaptation by Chris Hannan directed by Dominic Hill.
Then at the Festival Theatre, the world’s most romantic ballet is re-imagined as a circus spectacular in Circa's Duck Pond (Fri/Sat: tickets).
And now it gets interesting. Skye Loneragan finds herself representing Scotland in the brand new ‘Coping Strategies’ category of the Olympic Games as a Kitchen Dancer at Assembly Roxy (Ends Sat: tickets).
Then it is Heartstopper eat your heart out, as the EUTC bring Jonathan Harvey’s teen gay romance Beautiful Thing to the Bedlam (ends Sat: tickets).
Bologna’s Commedia dell’Arte specialists, the Fraternal Compagnia APS, have a wee residency at the Scottish Storytelling Centre as part of the Storytelling Festival, with Dedalus and Icarus (Thu: Tickets) and a Sat matinee of Masquerade Mask (tickets).
At Summerhall, Tragic Carpet are back with a new Suitcase Story: Nosferatu (Fri/Sat mats: tickets), an atmospheric telling of the 1922 silent horror film for children (8+) and adults.
Saturday at Summerhall is the Trajectories Showcase with productions by early-career theatre makers in each of the Anatomy Theatre (tickets) and the TechCube (tickets). Two pieces in each, both performed twice (3pm & 4.45pm). Man to Man? Roller-mania? 1984? Nah, this is the future right here... And there is more next week with the Gateway New Writing Festival at the Studio (Mon 2-Wed 4 Nov: details).
⭐️ Full details of these and all future productions on Æ's listings pages, all linked here.
📌 Edinburgh Culture Minute Community Noticeboard
🎶 Welcome to the Fringe Palestine, Crowdfunder Launch Party
Tomorrow, Thu 29 October - 'Welcome to the Fringe Palestine is coming back in 2027! Come join us for the launch party of our crowdfunder, hear from Festival Producer Sara Shaarawi and stay for a drink & a boogie with a DJ set from Arusa Qureshi.'
7.30pm to 10.30pm | Village · Leith - More details here, shared by Independent Arts Projects.
🎨 Colour Systems | Leigh Bagley [Until 20 Nov]
Fri 30 October - 'Colour Systems by Leigh Bagley explores colour through geometry, repetition and collage. Using circles, hand-cut compositions and digital prints, Bagley creates vibrant abstract works inspired by modernism and Bauhaus design.'
11am to 5pm | Upright Gallery · Bruntsfield | FREE - More details here, shared by Ian Farmer, Upright Gallery.
🎬 Community-Themed Film Screenings Kick Off This Weekend - 'The I LIKE IT HERE film series, taking place at Grassmarket Community Project, kicks off this Sunday with a screening of School of Rock alongside a live music performance from the GCP's own volunteer led band!' - More details here, shared by Grassmarket Community Picture House.
🎶 Record number of Edinburgh International Festival events to air free on Sky Arts - 'Including the sell-out Opening Concert with a performance of Wynton Marsalis’ monumental All Rise, with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and the inaugural Global Ideas Stage with former PM Gordon Brown, Ken Burns, Bryan Stevenson and Amy Goodman' - More details here, shared by Edinburgh International Festival.
🤣 Sand Improv
Sun 01 November - 'Sand, one of Chicago's best improv comedy groups, perform their show inspired by documentary film, traditional fairy tales, and the spectacle of professional wrestling.'
7.30pm to 8.30pm | Monkey Barrel Comedy · Old Town | £9 - More details here, shared by a Minute reader.
✨ 80 years of the Institut français d'Écosse!
Mon 02 November - 'From 2 to 7 November, don't miss a week of anniversary events at the Institut français d'Écosse: a mapping projection on the façade of the Institut, immersive guided tours, fascinating talks, and concerts of Christine Bovill and the Levi Harvey Trio!'
6pm to 9pm | French Institute of Scotland · Old Town - More details here, shared by Institut français d'Écosse.
😊 Rave to the Grave
Tue 03 November - 'Join us for Rave to the Grave, a play about a care home for the rave generation. Fresh off a development week with Capital Theatres, expect music, dance, disco biscuits & post-show discussion about the politics of the rave in current-day Europe.'
7pm to 10pm | Mote 102 · Leith | Donation or free - More details here, shared by The Hum.
🎭 No Woman is an Island: Dublin sell-out makes UK premiere at Traverse Theatre 13 & 14 November [Until Sun]
Fri 13 November - 'A sell-out at Dublin Theatre Festival, No Woman is an Island gets a UK premiere at the Traverse, 13-14 Nov. Part lecture, part confessional, it's a funny, sharp solo show about one woman's endless pursuit of solitude, or just some peace and quiet.'
7pm to 8pm | Traverse Theatre · Tollcross | £5.50 - 17.00 - More details here, shared by Storytelling PR.
🎭 'I am Not My Hair' free theatre show for ages 8-12
Sat 14 November - 'A joyful dance-theatre work created for Black and Mixed-Race girls aged 8-12 years old, celebrating Black hair, highlighting both the pressures young people face to fit in and the power of embracing who they are.'
7pm to 8pm | Lyra / ArtSpace · Craigmillar & Niddrie | FREE - More details here, shared by Lyra.
🤝 Below the paywall are this week’s local creative jobs and opportunities. Find your future here...
🎨 Leith School of Art is recruiting for a Drawing & Painting the Figure tutor for its Thursday evening Short Course. Pay: £33.70 per hour. Deadline: 22 November. - Apply here.
🎭 The Traverse Theatre is looking for a skilled Artistic Administrator to provide dedicated administrative and coordination support to the organisation. Salary: £27,976. Deadline: 23 November. - Apply here.
🟡 Edinburgh International Festival is looking for a new Assistant Ticketing and Revenue Manager. Salary: £30,500 to £32,000. Deadline: 6 November. - Apply here.
🎭 Three seasonal jobs at the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh just now:
- Commercial Operations Assistant. Pay: £13.45 per hour. Deadline: 17 November. - Apply here.
- Seasonal Customer Service Assistants. Pay: £13.45 per hour. Deadline: 4 November. - Apply here.
- Seasonal Box Office Assistants. Pay: £13.45 per hour. Deadline: 4 Nov. - Apply here.
👍 STILL OPEN ↴
🎭 Creative Scotland is offering a Professional Development Secondment within its theatre team. It's temporary and fixed-term for six months at 35 hours per week on a salary of £36,953.00 (pro-rata). Deadline: 30 October. - Apply here.
🎭 Capital Theatres are looking for someone to lead their technical crew across the venues as Head of Electrics. Salary: £52,583. Deadline: 30 October. - Apply here.
🤳 The National Film & Television School is recruiting a Programme Lead: YouTube Creator Incubator. Salary: £65,000. Deadline: 1 November. - Apply here.
🎨 Garvald Edinburgh is looking for a creative person to fill its vacancy for a Fixed Term Workshop Support Worker – Media Workshop and Art Studio. Salary: pro rata £25,877.80, three days per week. Deadline: 6 November. - Apply here.
🎟️ The Queen's Hall is hiring a full time Box Office and Customer Service Manager. Salary: £28,000-£32,000. Deadline: 9 November. - Apply here.
💰 Craigmillar-based Drake Music Scotland is seeking a Fundraising Officer. Salary: £28,000. Deadline: 12 November. - Apply here.
🎵 The Scottish Chamber Orchestra is seeking a Head of Concerts and Projects. Salary: £43k-£46k. Deadline: 17 November. - Apply here.
🎬 The National Film & Television School is looking for a Director to lead the newly established NFTS Sean Connery Institute in Scotland. Salary: £90,000. Deadline: 18 November. - Apply here.
🏴 The organisers of Hands Up for Trad are looking for a Scots Language Week Administrative Producer. Pay: £25 per hour. Deadline: 23 November. - Apply here.
🧵 Studio Nine Edinburgh seeks Freelance Sewing Teachers. Pay: £18 per hour. Deadline: 30 November. - Apply here.
🎭 Lung Ha Theatre Company, based on Grindlay Street, seeks a Company Manager to lead support team coordination, safeguarding, operational management and administrative functions. Salary: £30k. Deadline: Monday 2 November. - Apply here.
💻 Commissions of £8,000–£12,000 are available to around seven people to create 'curious and unexpected work that challenges, complicates and reimagines responsible AI'. Winning works are to be presented at the Edinburgh festivals next year. The commissions are funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and delivered by BRAID UK in partnership with Inspace Design Informatics, University of Edinburgh. Deadline: 2 November. - More details here.
👀 Find more local roles on the Creative Edinburgh jobs & opps board.
💌 Thanks to everyone who contributed to the 147th edition of The Edinburgh Culture Minute. Thank you for reading and subscribing. Please share this email to help it reach more people who want to have a good time!