This gorgeous mixed programme demonstrates the great creative vision of Frederick Ashton, Founder Choreographer of The Royal Ballet. The Dream is Ashton’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s riotous comedy in which a forest sprite plays havoc, armed with a love potion. Symphonic Variations was Ashton’s first work after World War II, and one of the Company’s first to be performed on the huge main stage of the Royal Opera House, in 1946. With six dancers performing a series of quartets, duets, sextets and solos to Franck’s brooding Variations symphoniques, this seminal masterpiece celebrates the pure beauty of movement. Marguerite and Armand is Ashton’s beautiful and emotional retelling of a well-known story, familiar to us through Verdi’s opera La traviata. Ashton famously created this poignant ballet on Margot Fonteyn  and Rudolf  Nureyev  in  1963.