The Royal Ballet has announced details of its 2025-26 season, one that includes world premieres by Wayne McGregor, Cathy Marston, Akram Khan, Sol León and Paul Lightfoot, and a first Royal Ballet presentation of work by New York City Ballet resident choreographer Justin Peck.
In Wayne McGregor: Alchemies, the choreographer will present a new work alongside two recent successes.
Cathy Martson’s new ballet, inspired by Benjamin Britten’s Violin Concerto, forms part of Perspectives: Balanchine, Marston, Peck triple bill. The Balanchine comes in the shape of his Serenade, which one hopes will be taken at the speed it is danced in New York, rather than the slower tempo too often seen elsewhere.
Justin Peck might be well-known in the United States, but his work is rarely performed elsewhere. Everywhere We Go, one of his best creations to date, was created in 2014 and is danced to a specially commissioned score by Sufjian Stevens. Developed over nine ‘chapters’ with titles such as ‘The Shadows Will Fall Behind,’ ‘To Live in the Hearts We Leave Behind’ and ‘The Gate of Heaven is Love,’ it does have its more poignant moments but it’s largely a ballet that brims with joy and exciting dance for its cast of 25. The costumes, designed by former NYCB principal dancer Janie Taylor, are gorgeous too. It should make a great end to the evening. As I said after seeing it in New York last autumn, it’s very much of today but, “The sort of ballet that makes you want to return.”
(pictured: New York City Ballet dancers Miriam Miller and Peter Walker)
Photo Erin Baiano
In another Royal Ballet debut, choreographic duo Paul Lightfoot and Sol León will stage a double bill, So Are We: León and Lightfoot. Originally choreographed as a film by Lightfoot during the pandemic in homage to the balletic art form, STANDBY will be recreated as a world premiere, with a new score by Ilya Demutsky. Shoot the Moon, celebrating its 20th anniversary, explores relationships and the solitude that lies within them.
In July 2026, Akram Khan poetically reimagines Alexander Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin in a new full-length ballet, Carnage and the Divine. Themes of innocence, desire, hope and memory will be explored through Khan’s contemporary lens and distinctive dance language.
Following its world premiere at Manchester International Festival, former Royal Ballet dancer Jonathan Watkins’ reimagining of Christopher Isherwood’s novel A Single Man will be presented in the Linbury Theatre. New, live music is by John Grant and Jasmin Kent Rodgman.
In the year of Glen Tetley’s centenary, the American choreographer’s surreal 1962 Pierrot Lunaire is revived. Re-interpreting Arnold Schoenberg’s atonal spoken song melodrama of the same name, Tetley takes stock characters from the 18th-century theatrical tradition of commedia dell’arte and throws them into an austere set by designer Rouben Ter-Arutunian.
Osipova/Linbury returns to the Linbury Theatre in a programme shining a spotlight on Principal dancer Natalia Osipova. The programme will include a revival of The Exhibition by Norwegian choreographer Jo Strømgren.
Alongside these revivals and premieres, a number of audience favourites return including Sir Frederick Ashton’s signature ballet La Fille mal gardée, which gets a double run, and Kenneth MacMillan’s Mayerling. Two Sir Peter Wright productions return: his superb Giselle with its atmospheric designs by John Macfarlane, and The Nutcracker. In September, Christopher Wheeldon’s Like Water for Chocolate is revived for the first time, while January sees the return of Wayne McGregor’s Woolf Works, inspired by the life and work of Virginia Woolf, with music by Max Richter.
The season also includes performances by numerous guest companies including Ballet Black, Fallen Angels Dance Theatre, Joburg Ballet, London City Ballet, Northern Ballet, Paul Taylor Dance Company, Yorke Dance Project and Tulsa Ballet, as well as the annual International Draft Works and Next Generation Festival programmes.