A Night at the Ballet with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra

Richard Strauss’s graphic Duet Concertino for clarinet, bassoon and orchestra was the composer’s final instrumental work. Its first movement is dominated by the solo clarinet representing a dancing princess, the second by a bassoon signifying a cavorting bear. Finally the princess dances with the bear and it becomes a prince.

This concert also includes two seminal ballet scores adapted or specially written for the great choreographer Sergei Diaghilev. Falla’s vibrant The Three-cornered hat is full of colour and the influence of Spanish dance. Stravinsky’s pulsating Petrushka comes with carousels, concertinas, dancers and popular songs. It ends with the eerie appearance of the puppet Petrushka’s ghost.

The talented Jaume Santonja Espinós also conducts Beethoven’s dramatic and stirring Egmont Overture.

Pre-concert talk with BBC Broadcaster Trisha Cooper starts at 6pm.