Before detailing Birmingham Royal Ballet’s 2025-26 season, director Carlos Acosta first spoke warmly about Caroline Miller, the company’s much-loved and highly regarded former CEO, who sadly passed away just before Christmas last year. He announced that the company’s Ashton Classics programme at the city’s Symphony Hall on February 15 will be dedicated to her, and that there will be a service of remembrance at Birmingham Cathedral on April 1. A memorial fund will also be established in her name.
As he marks five years at BRB, Acosta is clearly excited by the 2025-26 season, which sees the return the British stages of Black Sabbath – The Ballet. First, though, and following its European premiere in Rotterdam last June, the ballet is off on international tour again with dates in the USA at the Virginia Arts Festival (May 28-30) and the Kennedy Center, Washington DC (June 4-8).

(pictured: Javier Rojas and Yaoqian Shang)
Photo Johan Persson
Black Sabbath – The Ballet then comes home to open the new season at the Birmingham Hippodrome (September 18-27), followed by a national tour that takes in the Lowry, Salford (October 8-11); Plymouth Theatre Royal (October 16-18); Sadler’s Wells, London (October 22-25); and the Edinburgh Festival Theatre (October 30-November 1). The return includes some updated interview audio and even sharper sound design.
Summer 2025 also sees the Company’s return to Japan with The Sleeping Beauty (June 20-22) and Cinderella (June 27-29) at the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan. The Sleeping Beauty will also be performed in Osaka (July 2) and Nagoya (July 5).
Alongside The Sleeping Beauty, BRB’s digital project will be part of the highly prestigious Osaka Expo with an exhibition of photos by Clive Booth, inspired by the Company’s research into the effects of Relative Energy Deficiency in dancers, which runs from June 25 to July 1.
After breaking box office records in 2024, Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker returns for its usual festive slot at the Birmingham Hippodrome (November 21-December 13). The Royal Albert Hall presentation of the ballet is also back in London (December 29 – 31).
The Spring 2026 season begins in Birmingham with the return of Carlos Acosta’s production of Don Quixote, kicking off a UK-wide tour at the Hippodrome (Feb 12-21) before visiting The Lowry, Salford (March 5-7); Sunderland Empire (March 12-14); Plymouth Theatre Royal (March 18-21); and the Mayflower Theatre, Southampton (April 15-18).
Acosta observed that when BRB last performed Don Quixote in Spring 2022, the UK was in the shadow of the Omicron variant of Covid. Although the tour was successful, it is felt that the circumstances were less than ideal and that this revival can now flourish from an altogether more stable and positive context.
Finally, and after more than a decade-long absence, BRB will be returning to the Royal Ballet and Opera with Don Quixote as part of their 2026 Summer Season.
Sir Peter Wright celebrates his 99th birthday in November 2025. To mark his 100th year, the Birmingham run of Don Quixote will be interrupted on February 18 for what promises to be a very special evening. A celebration: Sir Peter Wright Centenary will consist of highlights from Sir Peter’s many classical productions for the company plus the BRB’s first performance of Kurt Jooss’ The Green Table since the early 1990s when Sir Peter himself brought it into the repertory.
Sir Peter not only started his career with Jooss’ company, but made his stage debut in the ballet. “1943. It was at Wolverhampton. The bombs were dropping and everything. I was a soldier and had to march across then get strangled by the guerrilla. So, you could say I died a death on my first appearance,” he told me many years ago.
Birmingham Royal Ballet’s second company, will embark on its fourth UK tour in Spring 2026 with dates to be announced. As with the 2025 tour, Carlos Acosta’s Ballet Celebration, a sort of ‘Diaghilev gala,’ will feature highlights from the repertory of the impresario’s troupe of rebel dancers, musicians and designers. The programme includes The Firebird, Spectre de la Rose, Les Sylphides and Scheherazade. As he spoke about how these works played a major role in his own development as an artist, Acosta noted that, like Nijinsky, he was 19 when he first danced in Scheherazade; also the age of many of BRB2’s dancers. Noting how the ballets have fallen somewhat out of fashion, he says it’s time they were brought back.
Spring 2026 also sees the main company perform a 20th-Century Masterpieces triple bill at the Birmingham Hippodrome (June 18-20) that is likely to have ballet fans swooning.
The programme combines sheer technical artistry with an exploration of the dark themes of war. The programme comprises The Green Table (1932) alongside the grandeur of George Balanchine’s Theme and Variations (1947) and Sir Frederick Ashton’s Birthday Offering (1956). The latter was made for the then Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet (in the year they became The Royal Ballet) to celebrate their 25th anniversary with a cast that included Margot Fonteyn. Helping BRB set it will be Darcey Bussell.