"Giselle" by Varna International Ballet and Orchestra.

Nottingham Royal Concert Hall.

This is the first time that Varna International Ballet and Orchestra from Bulgaria have visited the UK in their seventy-five-year history. They perform "Giselle", "Swan Lake" on Tuesday and Wednesday, and "Coppelia" on Thursday.

The story of "Giselle" is a romantic tale of innocent love and betrayal; of philandering Count Albrecht and a trusting peasant maid, Giselle. Although she has a weak heart, Giselle loves to dance.

Albrecht, in order to woo Giselle, disguises himself as a peasant. Giselle, in her innocence and unaware of his noble birth, resists Albrecht’s advances – only to succumb to his ardour and persistence. His plans are thwarted by the arrival in the village of a hunting party which includes the Duke of Courland and his beautiful daughter Bathilde, to whom Albrecht is already engaged.

Hilarion, a gamekeeper in love with Giselle, discovers Albrecht’s disguise and reveals his rival’s true identity. This sends Giselle crazy and Act One ends with her death.

Act Two continues with Giselle's ghost rising from the grave and as part of folklore, along with the other dead maidens have to entice men to dance with them all night until they die from exhaustion before dawn. 

Albrecht, full of remorse, comes to mourn at Giselle’s grave. The Queen of The Willis - which is what the dead maidens are called - commands Giselle to come from her grave and entice Albrecht to join her in dance. Giselle continues dancing with Albrecht through the night. Although she has been betrayed by Albrecht, Giselle still loves him, and helps him to stay alive until the dawn when Giselle returns to her grave and Albrecht's life is saved.

The story-telling in the first part was excellent and the story was easy to follow, but I was glad that I had looked up the second part of the story in the programme for the event, because not everything in Act two would have been easy to follow, had I not previously known the outcome.

The video design backdrop was also excellent in showing how the dead maidens, The Willis, rose from the dead, magically popping out of the graves within the graveyard, floating off to the sides of the backdrop and appearing in physical form. What I didn't get though was their dark side of enticing men to dance all night until their exhaustion killed them as the dancers on stage were all female, so with that part of the story being a bit vague, anyone not knowing the story may have been a bit lost. I know the couple next to me were definitely slightly confused as to what was happening, die to them asking each other what was happening at that part.

I do have a couple of gripes about this production. There were some parts of the ballet where the stage was exempt of dancers altogether, there also seemed to be quite a bit of noise from the dancer's feet as they landed; something I'd never really noticed from other ballets I've seen. I just wonder if this was due to this production was on the Concert Hall stage and not the Theatre Royal stage. Are the two stages built differently?

I also thought that the synchronicity between the two main leads at times were a little awry, but I look for these things and probably went unnoticed by the majority of tonight's audience. I'm by no means a specialist in this field but it was something that I did notice.

The acoustics in the Concert Hall though are great for music shows, and especially for orchestras like this one. But did my ears detect one of the violins sounding just a wee bit out of tune? Who knows! Music Director and Chief Conductor is Peter Tuleshkov produced a well-rounded lush sound, filling the Concert Hall with the gorgeous music of Adolphe Adam.

Minor criticisms, but this was just this one ballet, and it's a ballet that I had not seen before, so it may be me; there are the other ballets that Varna are performing this week, ballets that I have seen previously, so take my criticisms with a pinch of salt.

That said, the lead dancers are wonderful.

If you like classic ballet with men in tights and ladies in flowing dresses, then you'll love these shows.

The Varna International Ballet and Orchestra are at the Royal Concert Hall until Thursday 23 February.