National Youth Ballet and City of Sheffield Youth Orchestra join forces

The showcase of young dancers, choreographers, and musicians, conducted by Christopher Gayford will feature a contemporary re-telling of Kurt Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins, followed by Shostakovich’s Symphony No 5 and will take place at The Octagon.

The Seven Deadly Sins is a ballet chanté (sung ballet) composed by Kurt Weill, with words by Bertolt Brecht. For this project the piece will be choreographed by Alice O’Brien and Bianca Mikahil for a small company of NYB dancers, with the score performed by City of Sheffield Youth Orchestra. The dancers and orchestra will be joined by mezzo-soprano, Clover Kayne.

Alice O’Brien and Bianca Mikahil are part of National Youth Ballet’s Beyond Ballet programme, an initiative that supports emerging creative artists from all areas of the theatre industry in the early stages of their professional careers. This project will enable both the choreographers and dancers to learn the vital skills of working with live music, musicians and a conductor.

Alongside this project City of Sheffield Youth Orchestra and National Youth Ballet will also visit local schools, in partnership with South Yorkshire Dance Hub, to lead dance and music workshops for Key Stage 3 classes. A Creative Ballet workshop will also be held on Monday March 28 for Sheffield-based young dancers, led by National Youth Ballet creative director Jo Meredith and young artist Tierney Lawlor. The workshop will give dancers the chance to develop their classical technique, explore their creativity and imagination, and build confidence.

Tickets for the performance on April 14 at 7.30pm are £17 or £8.50 for under 21s and are now available at bit.ly/csyo_nyb