Edinburgh Festival Fringe: New Town theatre to become pop-up Scottish music venue

A total of 50 concerts will be staged next month at the Rose Theatre in the New Town

One of the biggest performing arts venues in Edinburgh's New Town is to make a surprise comeback during the Fringe – after a music promoter was offered the use of the building weeks before the event is due to get underway.

The Rose Theatre, which is based in a former Baptist church building on Rose Street, was closed up and put up for sale by Danish choreographer, dancer and director Peter Schaufuss in February with a £3 million price tag. However, he instigated moves to get Fringe shows back inside the West End venue earlier this month.

Promoters Soundhouse will be joining forces with Edinburgh's Bellfield Brewery to run the venue, which has been a fixture at the Fringe since 2017.

Shooglenifty will be performing at the Rose Theatre during next month's Fringe. Picture: Douglas Robertson

More than 50 concerts with ticket prices pegged at £15 will go on sale on Wednesday ahead of the venue’s transformation into a dedicated venue for Scottish music.

Many of the country's leading jazz and folk musicians are booked to appear, including Scottish Album of the Year winner Fergus McCreadie, Scottish National Jazz Orchestra founder Tommy Smith, festival favourites Fat Suit and Shooglenifty, and singers Adam Holmes and Georgia Cecile.

Ticketed performances will be staged in its cabaret bar and main auditorium, while pop-up performances are planned for the cafe-bar.

Gilded Balloon, one of the longest-running Fringe venue operators, took on the Rose Theatre for the 2017 festival and programmed events year-round until the Covid pandemic struck.

Peter Schaufuss put the Rose Theatre in Edinburgh's west end up for sale earlier this year. Picture: Greg Macvean

The venue was taken over by Edinburgh-based theatre company Captivate during last year’s Fringe, but had been expected to remain empty next month after the building was put up for sale.

Mr Schaufuss admitted it had become “too much” running it along with Saint Stephen's, in Stockbridge, where Sir Ian McKellen appeared in a theatre-dance production of Hamlet in August last year.

However, he has agreed a month-long lease that will see Soundhouse renew a partnership with the Bellfield Brewery, which was behind a pop-up venue at the old Royal High School on Calton Hill last August.

Soundhouse was formed by Douglas Robertson and Jane-Ann Purdy in 2013 after more than a decade of staging house concerts.

Jazz singer Georgia Cécile. .

The pair have been pursuing plans for a permanent new music venue while programming regular shows at the Traverse Theatre’s bar and taking over the running of Edinburgh's annual Tradfest event in the spring.

Other acts lined up at the Rose Theatre next month include the duos Jarlath Henderson and Innes Watson, Chris Stout and Catriona Mackay, Konrad Wisniewski and Haftor Medboe, and Inge Thomson and Fraser Fifield, and the groups Gnawa Trance Fusion, Mr McFall’s Chamber, Trio Magico and Viper Swing.

Mr Robertson said: “We’ll present a showcase of the best of Scottish music at this year’s Fringe. We believe our series will be the best that the Fringe has seen in living memory.

“Our main principles are to put on great gigs and sell great beer at a fair price, pay musicians and staff well, and provide a platform for Scotland’s best musicians.

The Rose Theatre in Edinburgh's West End will showcase leading Scottish music acts during next month's Fringe.

“Our events will provide the excitement, spontaneity and creativity that has long been replaced by the crass commercialism of the mega-venues around Edinburgh University.”

Bellfield Brewery founder Alistair Brown said: “Together we hope to offer some of the Fringe Festival’s coolest acts alongside tasty, locally-brewed craft beers.”