Jonny Greenwood’s love of strings takes centre stage as the Hallé performs his new Violin Concerto, which refracts electronic sounds through the orchestra – where more can go wrong.

In a world premiere at Aviva Studios, Sinéad O’Connor’s musical power and moral defiance is translated into dance by the Tony Award-winning Sonya Tayeh.

What are the North’s promoters, record labels, radio stations and magazines most excited about right now? SFTOC’s line-up is the answer to that question.

This Pulitzer Prize-winning opera brings a dark contemporary parable about exploitation, coercion and the abuse of power, underpinned by a score in which chamber music and cabaret collide with electronica and punk.

Connecting scenes, sounds and spaces across Manchester, Keep Walking brings a three-day, city-wide programme of gigs, club nights and workshops to some of the city’s most vital venues.

From cult hero to global collaborator, Thundercat is back with his first album in six years, and a headline show at Aviva Studios.

Voka Gentle return to Manchester with a headline show in YES Basement, bringing new material that pushes their already elastic sound into darker, stranger territory.

In these cheery, optimistic times, who’d have thought that musical brutalism would be having a moment? Manchester’s own Mandy, Indiana sit right in that current, returning with their second album and a live show in Leeds.

This summer, foundational British synth-pop band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark return to Rochdale, the town where they recorded ‘Electricity’, the breakthrough single that helped set their trajectory.

English National Opera takes its first ever bow at The Bridgewater Hall with Così fan tutte – Mozart’s sparkling comedy, presented in two semi-staged concert performances.

Celebrating 10 years as one of the UK’s best underground clubs, The White Hotel is retooling some of the Blackpool’s most recognisable sites for one-off, site-specific performances.

Sorry return to Manchester in February, this time headlining Gorilla with a new album that finally captures the full strangeness and clarity of a band who’ve spent years ducking easy categorisation.

Bar Italia, one of London’s most hyped bands of the last few years, are playing Manchester Academy 2 on 24 March 2026, returning off the back of their newest record, Some Like It Hot.

A hyped name among London’s underground scene, Mark William Lewis brings his skeletal and introspective indie rock to The White Hotel.