A concert curated and conducted by Oliver Knussen has as much interest as a new piece by this most reclusive and original of British composers. And Prom 26 – whose works he seems to have chosen because they reflect a fastidious control of detail equal to his own – allowed things which are not normally juxtaposed to shed fresh light on each other.

Royal Albert Hall, London

Back in London for the first time in 30 years, Boston Ballet look fresh, fast and strong. Balanchine’s Serenade, the first work on the company’s opening night, is both lyrical and democratic, full of moments when a corps dancer will stand out from the crowd. In the Boston performance, you notice a strong turn, a soaring jump. It’s like sunshine on water, a sparkle that lights up the dance without breaking its flow.

This is an unusual juxtaposition of seemingly incongruent composers, not least because of their contrasting attitudes to piano music – such an integral aspect of Beethoven's work, virtually an afterthought for Stravinsky, despite the instrument's centrality to his compositional process.

With performances of Apollon musagète and Oedipus Rex, John Eliot Gardiner has chosen to celebrate his seventieth birthday with two masterpieces from Stravinsky’s neo-classical period which could not be more different.

The Tardis is coming to the Royal Albert Hall as Doctor Who's 50th anniversary is celebrated during this year's Proms.

Stravinsky's 1913 ballet, The Rite of Spring, premiered to catcalls and fisticuffs.

Released to mark the centennial anniversary of its explosive premiere, Simon Rattle and the Berliner Philharmoniker's Rite of Spring is instantly engrossing from the opening woodwind flourishes.

Agon is one of Stravinsky's more extreme excursions into pure, plotless, abstract ballet, with neither story nor characters to hinder the choreographer.

A National Portrait gallery exhibition of the modernist's work is entirely dedicated to his photographic portraiture, much of which has never been displayed in this country before

The most powerful weapon in the opera designer’s armoury is lighting, which allows musical atmosphere to be changed by the flick of a switch: Ravel’s ‘L’enfant et les sortileges’ was never more resonant than when lit by David Hockney’s glowing reds, greens, and mauves.

The Week in Books

As belts continue to tighten, don't be too surprised by a sense of déjà vu, as theatres pad their schedules with known quantities (hello again, 50th-anniversary revival of West Side Story). This may be good news for those who missed, say, Akram Khan's marvellous Desh first and second times around (catch it once and for all at Sadler's Wells in June), or Sutra, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui's mesmerising date with 20 plywood cubes, and the Shaolin Monks (Sadler's Wells, March). But it's also good news for Scottish Ballet, who have persuaded Matthew Bourne to let them loose on Highland Fling, his deliciously grungy 1994 update on La Sylphide. It tours four Scottish venues in April and May.

‘In a park, at twilight, a tennis ball has got lost; a young man and two girls come looking for it. They start to play hide and seek, chase each other, quarrel and sulk...’