Review: London City Ballet’s Ghost Light haunts, but Firebird fails to ignite

London City Ballet recently returned to Sadler’s Wells for its third season with a provocative double bill that placed two prominent male choreographers at the forefront: John Neumeier and Glen Tetley. Under the direction of Christopher Marney, the company continues to pursue ambitious programming choices that challenge both dancers and audiences.

The evening opened with Neumeier’s Ghost Light, a piece specially reworked for London City Ballet and featuring the esteemed dancer Alina Cojocaru. Ghost Light rejects a traditional narrative, instead exploring the spectral presence of former dancers. Set against a minimalist black box stage with a solitary light source, the choreography conjured an atmosphere rich in shadow and suggestion. The haunting, subtle interplay of movement and mood invited contemplation rather than straightforward storytelling.

Within Ghost Light, Neumeier’s classical dance vocabulary reveals its emotional depth through contrasting pas de deux. Cojocaru’s duets with Joseph Taylor evoked ghostly apparitions—detached yet perfectly synchronized—while her interactions with Francesca Velicu and Nicolas Gläsmann felt more immediate and human, imbued with yearning and connection. The choreography’s delicate balance matched the melancholy but not despairing qualities of the Schubert score, enhancing the piece’s ethereal ambiance.

Despite its strengths, Ghost Light’s length proved a point of contention. While the craftsmanship and emotional resonance were acknowledged, the work’s duration—exceeding seventy minutes—was seen as overly indulgent, with some group sequences contributing less to the overall impact. Nevertheless, the ballet’s nuanced approach offers a rare glimpse of subtlety and patience in London’s contemporary dance scene.

By contrast, the evening’s second work, Glen Tetley’s Firebird, was less well received. Tetley’s interpretation reimagines the traditional Russian folklore story as a narrative of female emancipation. The plot follows a young woman escaping a repressive family environment, seeking liberation through love, but encountering new obstacles along the way.

Firebird’s visual and choreographic choices, however, divided opinion. The protagonist’s transformation from a somberly dressed figure to one adorned in fiery Lycra signals a shift from restraint to empowerment, culminating in a stylized white wedding scene. Despite technically accomplished performances, the ballet was criticized for lacking dramatic depth, coming across more as a series of sensual and athletic displays rather than a cohesive emotional journey.

The work’s thematic ambitions were noted, but its execution was characterized as a product of its era without contemporary resonance. The choreography’s focus on resistance and emancipation was conveyed through extended pas de deux and group sequences, yet the piece struggled to sustain engagement or offer fresh insights.

Christopher Marney’s programming decision to present two heavyweight choreographers reflects London City Ballet’s commitment to artistic exploration rather than commercial predictability. Neumeier and Tetley each bring distinct stylistic signatures—Neumeier’s classical elegance and psychological nuance contrasting with Tetley’s modernist physicality and narrative reinterpretation.

The evening underscored the contrasting ways contemporary ballet can approach storytelling and abstraction. Ghost Light’s introspective and haunting atmosphere invites viewers into a liminal space between memory and presence, while Firebird attempts a bold, if uneven, statement on liberation framed in a folkloric context.

Performers across both pieces demonstrated technical proficiency and expressive capability, though the material’s engagement varied. Notably, Neumeier’s inclusion of male dancers in intimate pas de deux offers a refreshing dimension to ballet’s narrative and emotional scope.

London City Ballet’s return to Sadler’s Wells with this double bill may not offer a uniformly successful experience, but it highlights the company’s willingness to take risks and present challenging work. As the landscape of ballet continues to evolve, such endeavors contribute to a broader dialogue about the art form’s direction and possibilities.

Details regarding audience reception and box office performance remain limited, but the artistic ambition evident in this programme reinforces London City Ballet’s position as a company unafraid to confront the complexities of contemporary choreography.