On Monday, the Bolshoi Ballet arrives in London to perform on the capital's largest stage: the Coliseum. Bolshoi means big, and there is no better word, for it is a company of gargantuan proportions, in its numbers and its dancing style. Under the leadership of its gifted Artistic Director, Alexei Ratmansky, the company is (controversially) broadening its repertoire and this three-week residency will see dances ranging from the purest Classical ballet to the latest in New York chic, (courtesy of UK-born, New York-based choreographer Christopher Wheeldon) and there is not a bar of Tchaikovsky in earshot.

Highlights include a recent re-construction of Marius Petipa's Imperial romp, Le Corsaire (realised using the Stepanov manuscripts housed at Harvard University), Spartacus with the Cuban sensation Carlos Acosta (whose recent debut had Muscovites declaring him the role's true heir) and a revival of Ratmansky's sparkling comedy The Bright Stream, in which he turns the tables on Bolshoi style and asks his dancers to perform with brilliant Danish speed (and his Danseur to drag up). Watch out also for two young stars, Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev separately, and together in Don Quixote on August 9th, plus old favourites: Svetlana Zakharova, Maria Alexandrova, Nikolai Tsiskaridze and Svetlana Lunkina.

By Ian Palmer