Alina Cojocaru heads Ballet Nights at the Theatre Royal on 9 December

Ballet Nights¹, a mixed bill of ballet, contemporary dance and live music, comes back to Theatre Royal Brighton on Wednesday 9 December at 7.30pm. Alina Cojocaru, a former principal of The Royal Ballet, leads the line-up. The company’s spring show at the theatre sold out.

Rather than one full-length ballet, the evening is a run of short pieces with a host, Giles Pearson, introducing each one. Paul Marque and Bleuenn Battistoni, étoiles of the Paris Opera Ballet, dance the White Swan pas de deux from Swan Lake in the first half and the Le Corsaire pas de deux to close the second.

Choreographer Kim Brandstrup has two works on the programme. Cojocaru dances his Afsked (Departure) duet with Seirian Griffiths, whom Ballet Nights calls an emerging star of UK contemporary dance. Griffiths also performs an extract from Brandstrup’s Breaking Bach.

Laurel Dalley Smith of the Martha Graham Dance Company performs Graham’s Satyric Festival Song. James Wilton and Sarah Jane Taylor dance “Summer”, set to Max Richter’s The Four Seasons, and Barbadian dancer Liam Woodvine performs Confession, his own piece to music by Elgar. Quartet Concrete play Britten, and baritone Patrick Alexander Keefe, an English National Opera Harewood Artist, sings “Largo al factotum” from The Barber of Seville with the quartet.

The show runs for 1 hour 50 minutes with a 20-minute interval. Tickets cost £30 to £110 from ATG Tickets².