The company opened its performance in High Wycombe with a piece from its early history. Les Rendezvous was made for Ninette de Valois’ Vic-Wells Ballet (which eventually became The Royal Ballet) in 1933.

At this time, when our national company was in its infancy, it was thought, owing to the success of the Ballets Russes, that ballet had to be Russian to have any significance. This is why the original leading dancer had changed her name from Marks to Markova.

However, Frederick Ashton and de Valois were looking for an English style, and this was the result. The great-choreographer–to-be said of his first major work: “Les Rendezvous has no serious portent at all; it is simply a vehicle for the exquisite dancing of Idzikowski and Markova.”

There is always a danger that a period piece like this may look dated, but this came up as fresh as a daisy. The company’s leading ballerina Nao Sakuma and her partner Chi Cao sailed easily and charmingly through choreography created for two of the great dancers of their era. This is a light-hearted work of meetings and partings, and found the whole company on top form.

Kin, by Alexander Whitley, is a complete contrast. It takes this classical company into contemporary territory, in a serious abstract work that may well be taking place in a stone-walled mausoleum. There may be no story, but this piece tells of people who are not happy. What are they experiencing?

Whitley’s telling choreography is danced, particularly by the excellent Delia Matthews and William Bracewell, with an air of yearning. Later in the work, a certain sweetness develops in the music, but this piece is more a beautiful lament than a rhapsody. Who would have thought tht Kenneth Macmillan, maker of long tragedies like Manon and Mayerling, would come up with something as jolly and jokey as Elite Syncopations, danced to Scott Joplin rags!

I remember the delight of the audience on the first night in 1974, when the curtain went up on an outrageously dressed on-stage band, and dancers in costumes reminiscent of Liquorice Allsorts. In a series of funny, often saucy dances, Nao Sakuma and Samara Downs (with a naughty twinkle in her eye) were outstanding.