The Sarasota Ballet has announced its 2025-2026 season, marking a series of anniversaries and milestones that will include live music from The Sarasota Orchestra for Programs Two, Three, Six and Seven, world premieres by Gemma Bond, Jessica Lang and Ashley Page, and ballets by Will Tuckett, Sir David Bintley and, of course, Sir Frederick Ashton. 

Here's a look at the upcoming season in detail.

Jacob’s Pillow 2025

The season officially kicks off with the ballet’s return to Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the Berkshires a decade after the company’s debut there in 2015. From July 16-20, the company will perform a mixed program at the Ted Shawn Theatre featuring Sir Frederick Ashton’s Birthday Offering and Dante Sonata, as well as a world premiere by Jessica Lang.

Program One: Intrinsic

Oct. 24-26, 2025, FSU Center for the Performing Arts

The Sarasota season opens with Dame Alicia Markova’s production of Fokine’s Les Sylphides, a Romantic-era ballet that set the tone for future choreographers to create works that established the story of the ballet in music and movement rather than plot. Scored by Chopin, the production takes place in a moonlit forest while ethereal sylphs dance around a young male poet—a role originally created on the legendary dancer Vaslav Nijinsky. The production will also honor the 100^th anniversary of Dame Markova joining The Ballets Russes.

Continuing the program is the Sarasota premiere of Virginia B. Toulmin & Muriel O’Neil Artist in Residence Jessica Lang, who has more than over 100 original works for companies including American Ballet Theatre and the Birmingham Royal Ballet.

Program One wraps up with Will Tuckett’s Changing Light, inspired by the beauty of Sarasota sunsets and reflected in fluid, circular movements, lighting design and costuming. 

Program Two: Written Motion

Nov. 21-22, 2025, Sarasota Opera House (accompanied by the Sarasota Orchestra)

Ushering in Program Two is a world premiere by choreographer Ashley Page, a former dancer with The Royal Ballet and the former artistic director of the Scottish Ballet.

Program Two also features Ashton's Illuminations, one of only two ballets he choreographed for the New York City Ballet. Originally inspired by a series of poems by French poet Arthur Rimbaud, the choreography translates the surrealist world of Rimbaud's dark themes into powerful physical movement that are accompanied by Benjamin Britten’s song cycle of 10 of the poems.

Rounding out Program Two is the return of Mark Morris’ The Letter V,  choreographed to Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 88 in G Major.

Program Three: Masters of Movement

Dec. 19-20, 2025, Sarasota Opera House (accompanied by the Sarasota Orchestra)

Program Three kicks off with Balanchine’s Divertimento No. 15, an audience favorite thanks to its intricate moving and shifting of partners to the tune of Mozart’s score. The ballet, originally created to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Mozart's birth, also serves as a tribute to Balanchine's long-standing admiration for the composer.

Next up is Mozartiana, a company premiere that's a marriage of Balanchine and Tchaikovsky’s shared appreciation for Mozart.

Finally, Ashton’s witty, vibrant Jazz Calendar brings the program to a light-hearted close with choreography inspired by the nursery rhyme “Monday’s Child” and set to Richard Rodney Bennett’s jazz score. Each section of the ballet personifies a day of the week through character-driven choreography and unique visual elements and costumes. 

Program Four: Notes Unspoken

Jan. 30-Feb. 2, 2026, FSU Center for the Performing Arts

Program Four introduces the Company’s third world premiere of the season:  a new ballet by choreographer Gemma Bond.

Next, in celebration of the 90^th anniversary of its world premiere, Antony Tudor’s Lilac Garden returns to the company’s repertoire, unfolding under the backdrop of an evening garden party in Edwardian England. Known as a psychological ballet, this dramatic narrative work navigates the emotional love triangle of a young woman, her lover and the man she must marry.

The program concludes with Ricardo Graziano’s Valsinhas, which is Portuguese for “little waltzes.” The split gender split cast— one entirely female and the other entirely male—each performs 25 waltzes that are less than a minute in length.

Program Five: Martha Graham Dance Company

Feb. 27-March 2, 2026, FSU Center for the Performing Arts

As part of its three-season-long 100th anniversary celebration, Martha Graham Dance Company takes to Sarasota stage in Program Five. The company was founded in 1926 by Martha Graham and has been recognized as “one of the great dance companies of the world” by The New York Times and “one of the seven wonders of the artistic universe” by The Washington Post. 

Program Six: Life & Liberty

March 27-28, 2026, Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall (accompanied by the Sarasota Orchestra)

'Still Life' at the Penguin Café, choreographed by Sir David Bintley, kicks off Program Six with the eclectic original music of Simon Jeffes and his Penguin Café Orchestra. A cautionary tale about our fragile environment and humans' indifference to its survival, it's served up with wit and imagination and  without preachiness.

To honor the 250^th anniversary of the United States of America, the second half of Program Six will showcase Balanchine’s celebratory Stars & Stripes alongside the iconic music of John Philip Sousa. 

Program Seven: Foundations of Royalty

May 1-2, 2026, Sarasota Opera House (accompanied by the Sarasota Orchestra)

Closing out the season, Program Seven presents a triple bill of work by  Ashton, Dame Ninette de Valois and Sir Peter Wright. Ashton's Birthday Offering opens the program, featuring seven couples in a series of variations set to Alexander Glazunov's score and culminating in an ensemble waltz.

The program continues with Checkmate, presented in honor of Dame Ninette de Valois, founder of The Royal Ballet, and marking the 25th anniversary of her passing. Checkmate is regarded as the cornerstone of British ballet and a striking example of de Valois's dramatic choreography. As it unfolds, the ruthless Black Queen hunts her prey—the aging Red King—in a battle of power and fate.

Ending the program—and the season—is Wright's Summertide, a celebration of the choreographer’s 100^th birthday on Nov. 25, 2026. An abstract expression of Felix Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 2, Summertide captures the brilliance of one radiant day in a one-act ballet. Choreographed in 1976 for the Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet, the principal role was created for The Sarasota Ballet’s own Margaret Barbieri. It was last performed here in 2015.