RAYE performs her number-one album This Music May Contain Hope in full with The Heritage Orchestra, a symphonic return to the Hall where her 2023 orchestral night was filmed.
RAYE performs This Music May Contain Hope, her first UK number-one album, in full at the Royal Albert Hall in South Kensington on Friday 23 October 2026. The Heritage Orchestra and Flames Collective join her.
Born Rachel Keen in Tooting and raised in Croydon, she learned piano from her father, a church musical director. Polydor signed her at 17, and she sang on dance hits such as Jax Jones’s “You Don’t Know Me”.
In 2021 she left the label, which had declined to release her debut album. She issued My 21st Century Blues independently two years later, and “Escapism” became her first UK number one. In 2024 she won six BRIT Awards, a record for a single year.
The new album moves across four seasons, from darkness to light. It is shortlisted for this year’s Mercury Prize, and its single “Where Is My Husband!” reached number one in the UK.
The format began in this room. In 2023 she brought My 21st Century Symphony to the Hall, and its film was nominated for a Grammy as Best Music Film.
The 50-piece Heritage Orchestra and Flames Collective, who played that 2023 night, return alongside her band.