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The Royal Albert Hall turns out to be a wonderful venue for Birmingham Royal Ballet's transporting Nutcracker.

Carlos Acosta proves that he is still one of the world's greatest dancers, performing to packed houses and adoring audiences.

Sir Peter Wright’s production returns to Birmingham Royal Ballet after an absence of five years, with Céline Gittens and Brandon Lawrence sharing great chemistry. 

A unique marriage of production and performance space provides a spactacle synonymous withe spirit of Christmas 

It is good to see Birmingham Royal Ballet in such fine fettle. This triple bill is well conceived and deftly performed. Not always flawless in its execution, but a five star programme nonetheless.

It starts like a scene from Mary Poppins, with penguin waiters nimbly weaving between waltzing couples, but ends with a deft blow to the stomach to deliver its environmental message.

David Bintley's 2010 Birmingham Royal Ballet version of Cinderella is the antithesis to Ashton. Instead of pantomime, he offers pure fairy tale every magical step of the way.

It can’t be easy to programme a Shakespeare season that has something new to say about this giant figure in a year of excellent productions up and down the country, but this programme achieves it. 

True to its origin in the Romantic period of the 19th century, this Swan Lake dances the Royal Birmingham Ballet into history because of the beauty of its leading dancer, Céline Gittens, one of the world's first non-white ballerinas.

Celebrating 20 years as Artistic Director of Birmingham Royal Ballet, David Bintley brings the company to London, where Balanchine’s Serenade acts as a delicate sorbet before the excesses of Bintley’s own Carmina burana.  

The evening was a step back into childhood nostalgia, of getting on the hired coach with my brother and neighbours from our cul-de-sac, to drive up to London for the traditional Christmas pantomime. And, of course, Aladdin with all that mystical eastern magic was always a favourite with us kids.