Triple Bill: Royal Opera House, London

The Rite of Spring eclipsed by Nimrod

Given that multiple short works are harder to sell than full-evening ballets, the Royal Ballet has stuck its neck out this season. The reason is the Frederick Ashton centenary. To taste the full breadth of his work, tapas menus are in order, and the latest revives a typical Ashton mini-masterpiece alongside works by Kenneth MacMillan and David Bintley, the man once courted as Ashton's successor.

Given that multiple short works are harder to sell than full-evening ballets, the Royal Ballet has stuck its neck out this season. The reason is the Frederick Ashton centenary. To taste the full breadth of his work, tapas menus are in order, and the latest revives a typical Ashton mini-masterpiece alongside works by Kenneth MacMillan and David Bintley, the man once courted as Ashton's successor.

The beauty of Ashton's Enigma, set to Elgar's famous variations, is that it neatly throws the focus back on the composer. In 1898 Elgar was still teaching the violin in Worcestershire. His friends humoured his ambition to compose, but their support was wearing thin. Only Mrs Elgar spurred him on, and it was she who, hearing his latest piano tinklings, said the tune reminded her of someone. So was born the idea of variations based on Elgar's social set.

Julia Trevelyan Oman's designs leave little to the imagination. Characters wobble on vintage bikes, the women are trussed like legs of mutton, their men harrumph through thickets of facial hair. Yet Ashton's dances cut through the Edwardian clutter, proving how few steps it takes to evoke an entire personal world. Among a dozen sharp performances several stand out: Vanessa Palmer's gracious Winifred Norbury, Ric Cervera's hyperactive Troyte, and a Nimrod variation so intense that it quite constricts the heart. Christopher Saunders, as Elgar, Isabel McMeekan as his wife, and William Tuckett as their friend Jaeger, invest their trio with such emotional potency that it comes as a surprise to read that in that particular number, Elgar was merely "discussing Beethoven" with his friend. The Royal's dancers excel in this kind of character study, and it's hard to imagine Ashton or Elgar being better served.

Alas, neither of the evening's bookends can match this emotional pitch. David Bintley's Tombeaux, glamorous as it is in Jasper Conran's sooty tutus, is opaque to the point of irritation. What motivates the corps in their strange, stooping actions? What is that bridge-shaped blob on the backcloth supposed to be - a Stonehenge monolith? A giant toad? A judge's wig? If you enjoy the orchestral bombast of William Walton, then all this is by the by - the orchestra gives plenty of oomph to his Hindemith Variations. Otherwise, there's not a lot to get hold of, bar the stunt of the ballerina casually flipping over her partner's head to hang down his back like a bat.

Kenneth MacMillan's Rite of Spring is an infinitely meatier piece of dance, but on Wednesday it oddly failed to add much beyond the experience of its great, sternum-crushing score.

jenny.gilbert@independent.co.uk

Triple bill: Royal Opera House, London WC2 (020 7304 4000), in rep to 16 April