Birmingham Royal Ballet to perform on Glastonbury Festival's Pyramid Stage

Birmingham Royal Ballet (BRB) is set to make its debut at the festival on June 30.

Taking to the main Pyramid Stage, BRB will perform Interlinked by choreographer Juliano Nunes.

It will be the only ballet company to perform at this year’s festival, performing in front of thousands of festival-goers and broadcast to millions across the globe.

Director Carlos Acosta said: "We are honoured to be bringing ballet to the iconic Pyramid Stage at this year’s Glastonbury Festival. All of us at BRB are ready and raring to bring Glastonbury festival-goers a performance to be remembered, as will we too.

"The young and extremely talented Juliano Nunes’s Interlinked has become an audience favourite since its premiere in 2022 as part of the Birmingham 2022 Festival marking the Commonwealth Games in our home city. Since then, it has gone on to play in venues across the UK and USA, including last year’s New York Pride celebrations.

"It seems like the perfect fit to bring to the Pyramid Stage in 2024."

The performance of Interlinked will feature a specially composed score by Australian composer Luke Howard and lighting design from Netherlands-based Northern Irish designer Tom Visser.

The piece, which will be performed by 16 dancers, will explore themes of gender identity and the perception of self, falling into four distinct movements.

It is described as "an abstract piece that explores themes of unity, the influences that we have on each other’s lives, and how the energy that we exude bounces from one person to the next, in a never-ending circle".

It comes after BRB's sell-out success of Black Sabbath - The Ballet in 2023 and a 2024 UK tour of one of the company’s classics, Sir Peter Wright’s The Sleeping Beauty.

Later this year, BRB will present the world premiere of Luna, a new work inspired by the pioneering women of Birmingham presented by an all-female creative team.