Damiano Michieletto's sizzling new production evokes all the passion and heat of Bizet's score, which features Carmen’s sultry Habanera and the rousing Toreador song. Antonello Manacorda conducts an exciting international cast, with Aigul Akhmetshina performing the title role.

Music Georges Bizet
Conductor Antonello Manacorda
Director Damiano Michieletto
Set Designer Paolo Fantin
Costume Designer Carla Teti
Lighting Designer Alessandro Carletti
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Co-production with Teatro Real, Madrid and La Scala, Milan

Out hunting, Prince Siegfried chances upon a flock of swans. One among them transforms into the beautiful human Odette and he is immediately enamoured. But Odette is bound by a spell which keeps her captive as a swan during the day. Can Siegfried free her?

Tchaikovsky’s sensational score combines with the evocative imagination of choreographer Liam Scarlett and designer John Macfarlane to heighten the dramatic pathos of Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov’s quintessential ballet classic. Swan Lake remains to this day one of the best-loved works in the classical ballet canon.

Choreography Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov
Additional Choreography Liam Scarlett and Frederick Ashton
Music Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
Production Liam Scarlett
Designer John Macfarlane
Lighting designer David Finn
Conductor Martin Georgiev
Royal Ballet Sinfonia
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Danses Concertantes, commissioned by Ninette de Valois in 1955, was MacMillan’s first major work. An early sign of the incredible artistic output that would follow, the work’s critical success spurred MacMillan to abandon performing in favour of choreography. It is followed by Different Drummer, MacMillan’s complex and haunting balletic interpretation of Woyzeck, Georg Büchner's play about a soldier’s descent into madness. The mixed programme concludes with Requiem, his 1976 work for Stuttgart Ballet, created in memory of its late artistic director, MacMillan’s friend and former Royal Ballet dancer and choreographer John Cranko.

Choreography Kenneth Macmillan

Danses Concertantes
Music Igor Stravinsky
Designer Nicholas Georgiadis
Lighting Designer John B. Read

Different Drummer
Music Anton Webern/ Arnold Schoenberg
Set designs Kenneth Macmillan
Costume designs Yolanda Sonnabend in association with Peter Farley
Lighting design John B. Read

Requiem
Music Gabriel Fauré
Designs Yolanda Sonnabend in association with Peter Farley
Lighting design John B. Read
Conductor Koen Kessels

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

When the young geisha, Cio-Cio-San, marries American Naval Officer Pinkerton, she believes she is entering a real, binding marriage for life. Forsaking her religion and community, she learns all too late that for Pinkerton, their marriage is merely an illusion – with tragic consequences.

With a score that includes Butterfly’s aria, 'Un bel dì, vedremo' (‘One fine day’) and the Humming Chorus, Giacomo Puccini’s opera is entrancing and ultimately heart-breaking. Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier’s exquisite production takes inspiration from 19th-century European images of Japan. Asmik Grigorian performs the role of Cio-Cio-San, with Kevin John Edusei conducting.

Music Giacomo Puccini
Conductor Kevin John Edusei
Directors Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier
Set Designer Christian Fenouillat
Costume Designer Agostino Cavalca
Lighting Designer Christophe Forey
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
A co-production with Gran Teatre del Liceu, Barcelona

This adaptation of Abbé Prévost’s novel embodies Kenneth MacMillan at his best, his acute insight into human psychology and his mastery of narrative choreography finding full expression in the impassioned duets of the central couple, visceral and urgent in their desire. The heroine’s struggle to escape poverty make Manon one of the most dramatic and devastating of ballets, emphasized by Nicholas Georgiadis’ evocative designs that reflect the juxtaposition between Manon’s impoverished origins and the lavish world she longs to inhabit. The 2023/24 Season celebrates the centenary of Nicholas Georgiadis.

Choreography Kenneth Macmillan
Music Jules Massenet
Orchestration Martin Yates
Designer Nicholas Georgiadis
Lighting designer Jacopo Pantani
Conductor Koen Kessels
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Rusalka, a water spirit, lives with her family in the pure waters of the forest lake. When she falls in love with a Prince, she sacrifices her voice and leaves her home in the hope of finding true love in a new world – a world that does not love her back.

Natalie Abrahami and Ann Yee create a poetic, contemporary new staging of Dvořák’s lyric fairy tale, revealing our uneasy relationship with the natural world and humanity’s attempts to own and tame it. Semyon Bychkov conducts an all-star cast featuring Asmik Grigorian (Jenůfa) in the title role.

Sung in Czech with English subtitles
Music Antonín Dvořák
Conductor Semyon Bychkov
Created by Natalie Abrahami and Ann Yee
Directors Ann Yee and Natalie Abrahami
Set designer Chloe Lamford
Costume designer Annemarie Woods
Lighting designer Paule Constable
Choreographer Ann Yee

Don Quixote, based on Miguel de Cervantes’ epic novel of the same name, regales the adventures of the eccentric nobleman Don Quixote and his faithful squire Sancho Panza, as they help to bring a vivacious young couple, Kitri and Basilio, together. This energetic 19th-century ballet is enlivened by Ludwig Minkus’ spirited score and is a wonderful showcase for the virtuosity of The Royal Ballet's Principal dancers. Created for The Royal Ballet a decade ago, Carlos Acosta’s exuberant production featuring Tim Hatley’s characterful designs brings the heat and romance of Cervantes' classic novel to life.

Production and choreography Carlos Acosta after Marius Petipa
Music Ludwig Minkus
Arranged and orchestrated by Martin Yates
Designer Tim Hatley
Lighting Designer Hugh Vanstone
Conductor Valery Ovsyanikov
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Country boy Nemorino is determined to win the haughty Adina’s heart, but she refuses to give him the time of day. Can Doctor Dulcamara’s so-called ‘elixir of love’ work its magic? Conductor Sesto Quatrini makes his house debut, as does soprano Nadine Sierra in the role of Adina. She is joined by Liparit Avetisyan, Boris Pinkhasovich and the incomparable Bryn Terfel as the genial wheeler-dealer Doctor Dulcamara.

Sung in Italian with English subtitles
Music Gaetano Donizetti
Conductor Sesto Quatrini
Director Laurent Pelly

When a precious hoard of gold is stolen from the river Rhine, it unleashes a chain of destructive events, pitting gods and mortals against one another for generations. Wagner’s Ring cycle boasts some of the greatest music ever written for the opera stage. Join us as we embark on a spectacular journey into the world of myth, dream and memory, with the figure of Erda – Mother Earth herself – at its centre. Antonio Pappano conducts Barrie Kosky’s bold new imagining of Wagner’s Das Rheingold – which marks the start of a new Ring cycle for The Royal Opera – with an outstanding cast including Christopher Maltman (Wotan) and Christopher Purves (Alberich).

Sung in German with English subtitles
Music Richard Wagner
Conductor Antonio Pappano
Director Barrie Kosky