It's a brave venture to take a programme of three jazz works and a live band of more than 20 musicians on tour, but this is a great evening from Birmingham Royal Ballet and the audience certainly gets its money's worth.

As soon as Colin Towns and his Mask Orchestra launch into Dave Brubeck's familiar Take Five (also the title of the opening work) we know we are in for a musical treat, and this is well matched by the suite of dances created by David Bintley.

BRB is of course a classical company, but their pure, elegant style and Bintley's classical vocabulary sit well on these quite formally constructed jazz numbers. Carol-Anne Millar and Elisha Willis are particularly impressive in Take Five and Two Step respectively, while Kosuke Yamamoto excitingly lives up to the title of Flying Solo.

The whole of this triple bill is a tribute to Bintley's jazz hero, Duke Ellington. We don't hear from Ellington himself until the final work, but The Orpheus Suite (pictured) draws parallels between Ellington's own life and the story of Orpheus - both outsiders despite their fame.

Orpheus, one of the Argonauts, is married to the nymph Eurydice who dies while fleeing the advances of Aristaeus. Orpheus is given permission to enter Hades to bring her back, providing he does not turn to look at hear. He does, and all is lost.

Bintley has set the bones of this tale in the 1930s. Orpheus, instead of playing the lyre, runs a jazz band with his dinner-jacketed Argonauts as its members. There is a terrific opening number from them to the specially commissioned music by Colin Towns. Hades, guarded by three "Moisturisers" - sexily played by Samara Downs, Victoria Marr and Angela Paul - is a lurid brothel, seemingly lit by the fires of hell.

Down there Orpheus finds scantily-clad Groupies and Furies engaged in a series of raunchy dances. He also finds Eurydice - touchingly danced by Elisha Willis in a lyrical style that sets her apart from the abandoned goings-on in Hades.

This is actually a sad story - Orpheus is dismembered by the Furies - but it's fun to watch, and performed with pulsating energy by both the dancers and the band.

Finally comes The Shakespeare Suite, to Ellington's own music, which consists of a series of duets between some of Shakespeare's best known characters - Petruchio and Kate, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, Bottom and Titania and so on, with a finale in which they all dance together. This is a pleasing, witty piece, but without the dramatic power of Orpheus.

Birminghan Royal Ballet's visit to the New Theatre continues tonight and tomorrow with Swan Lake, which will be reviewed here next week. Tickets can be reserved by calling 0870 606 3500.