Last Updated on May 6, 2026
An evening of exhilaration and elegance
Last night, The Royal Ballet presented New Works at The Festival of New Choreography in which four world premieres were performed in one wonderful evening. The new works were choreographed by four international choreographers, Gemma Bond, Joshua Junker, Mthuthuzeli November and Jessica Lang, all making their choreographic debut on the Main Stage. This Festival is inspired by The Royal Ballet’s commitment to new choreography and will be continuing throughout February, championing new works that will take place over the entire building including in The Linbury Theatre, with Dark with Excessive Bright, (an immersive ballet by Robert Binet) and in the Clore Studio with Duets.
The first work of the evening was Boundless by Gemma Bond, a former member of The Royal Ballet and American Ballet Theatre, where she became increasingly involved in choreography and stopped dancing in 2019 to focus on it completely. In Boundless, Gemma Bond was influenced by her young daughter’s playing in the playground with other children, where their movement was free and exhilarating and had no limiting constraints.
Boundless is set to music by Joey Roukens, a young Dutch composer, and it is a concerto, “In Unison”, for orchestra and two pianos, played by Kate Shipway and Robert Clark. The music is really dramatic and memorable and was described by Gemma Bond as ‘a real roller coaster’ and the very difficult piano parts played exceptionally well.
The ballet has twelve dancers, in elegant and subtle costumes by Charlotte Macmillan, grey and lilac white set against a dark background. They were led by Yasmine Naghdi and Ryoichi Hirano and they all danced beautifully to the choreography which was very often fast and complex, with a stunning pas de deux by Naghdi and Hirano, demonstrating Bond’s desire for the dancers to respond to the music and to tell the story of the dance through emotions.
The next premier of the evening was Never Known, with choreography by Joshua Junker. He is a First Artist of the Royal Ballet and has previously enjoyed creating works for Draft Works and has also created works for the Dutch National Ballet. Never Known is an amazing work in a dark setting illuminated at times by office-looking lights and at others with a light from above, in which the twenty dancers, soft-footed in socks and dressed in grey, light blue and soft lilac costumes, dance their beautiful both fluid and supremely rhythmical movements and perform duets with snappy head movements and tremendously high lifts.
There were many outstanding duets and solos – I particularly loved the duet between Liam Boswell and Madison Bailey with its intense innovative movements and her duet with Lukas B. Brændsrød, especially the one-handed lift, which was quite spectacular. The duet between Liam Boswell and Francisco Serrano was beautiful. The amazing music by Nils Frahm and Vikingur Olafsson was so complementary to the ballet, both in its techno style and human warmth. I loved its 3-in-a-bar groove. This work had a rather forbidding feeling. with its smoky vibe and the growl-like sounds of the music as if there was something rather sinister off-stage.
After the interval, we were treated to For What it’s Worth by Mthuthuzeli November, who has won an Olivier Award and a Black British Theatre Award for his creativity and who enjoys fusing African and Western dance. This was a delightful work, so joyful and colourful and it was rapturously received. Yann Seabra designed the wonderful costumes – gorgeous colours of pinks, greens and vibrant blues all reminiscent of a strong African sun and an expansive dynamic landscape. Mayara Magri was portraying Mama Africa and wore a long green dress with an orange scarf attached to one shoulder and a flat circular headdress, and her dance was strong and beautiful. All the dancing and the duets were delightful and it was a wonderful cast of dancers including Leo Dixon, Hannah Grennell and Isabel Lubach. The music was by November Mthuthuzeli himself and Alex Wilson, with drumming by the amazing West African percussionist Sidiki Dembele who brought fire rhythms to the dance.
The final work of the evening was Twinkle and this was quite special, giving me echoes of the lovely work Dances At a Gathering (Jerome Robbins, 1969) for its warmth and beauty. The set was met with a collective sigh of wonder when revealed: a black piano on a small black stage, a large golden star in the top right of the stage and a grey sky with wispy clouds. The creator of this work is the American director and choreographer, Jessica Lang who has created ballets for companies all over the world including ABT, Birmingham Royal Ballet, The National Ballet of Japan and The Joffrey Ballet and she also choreographs for opera. Twinkle is a suite for ten dancers, set to the music firstly of Johannes Brahms’s Lullaby, for which William Bracewell danced a most beautiful and elegant solo, and then to Mozart’s variations on Ab vous dirai-je, Maman which we know as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
The dancers shone in this ballet, with its exquisite choreography, beautiful movements, humorous timing and elegance. Fumi Kaneko, with her incredible technique, was charming and full of joy. Kate Shipway played the variations on the piano with great musicality. I loved the way all the various dances suited the particular variations perfectly, allowing all the dancers their time to shine.
The lighting designer, who excelled for the evening, was Zeynep Kepekli. She is a London-based lighting designer who works worldwide on different dance, opera, theatre, and ballet projects and is influenced by nature, geography and architecture.
All in all, a beautiful and memorable evening for which I would urge you to go and buy a ticket directly. I am certainly tempted to go and see it again.
New Works continues on the Main Stage until 21 February as part of the Festival of New Choreography running from 5- 21 February. For more about the programme check the Royal Opera House website
Royal Opera House
Bow Street
London
WC2E 9DD
For more about the current season of ballet check our roundup of what’s on at the Royal Opera House
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