Tony Iommi made a surprise appearance at the premiere of the new Black Sabbath ballet in Birmingham.
The ballet, announced earlier this year, opened at the Birmingham Hippodrome last Saturday (September 23) and will run until this weekend (September 30), before moving on to Plymouth’s Theatre Royal and Sadler’s Wells in London. Tickets can be booked here.
Iommi was involved in the creation of the ballet, working with Birmingham Royal Ballet director Carlos Acosta. The show will include eight of the band’s tracks plus new music inspired by them, all performed live by the Royal Ballet Sinfonia.
At the end of the opening performance, Iommi joined the cast on stage to play guitar for Sabbath hit ‘Paranoid’, while others in attendance included the band’s bassist Geezer Butler, Sharon Osbourne and Led Zeppelin‘s Robert Plant.
See footage from opening night below.
Thanks to everyone who supported us at the Ballet, we had a great premiere last night. I’m honoured to be involved with these talented dancers. I’m afraid I won’t be joining every performance. Tony
Posted by Tony Iommi on Sunday, September 24, 2023
Black Sabbath the Ballet! Amazing
Posted by Michaela Porter on Sunday, September 24, 2023
Tony iommi.So great to see tony onstage again tonight.He came on in the end and did paranoid..Brilliant night.
Posted by Michael Suilleabhain on Saturday, September 23, 2023
Speaking about the production ahead of its opening, Iommi said: “It’s so different, and it’s something that a lot of people didn’t expect, including me.”
He admitted to the broadcaster, however, that he had never been to a ballet in his life. “But to come in, and working with these guys, and seeing it, it’s just fantastic. And the work that they put in is just amazing,” he said.
Meanwhile, Iommi told Birmingham World that the ballet had made him “look at our music differently now” because it had been “interpreted in a different way”.
“It’s still got the basic things, but then it did have in the different orchestral things coming in. And then I never thought for a minute we would have people dancing to ‘Black Sabbath’ and ‘War Pigs’ and ‘Iron Man’,” he said.
Asked whether he thinks the ballet could inspire metal fans to become ballet fans, and vice versa, Iommi answered: “I certainly hope so. I mean, it is a strange combination, but you’ve got to push the boat out. And, you know, hopefully, we can get everybody together.”
The eight Black Sabbath songs used in the ballet are ‘Paranoid’, ‘Iron Man’, ‘War Pigs’, ‘Black Sabbath’, ‘Solitude’, ‘Orchid’, ‘Laguna Sunrise’ and ‘Sabbath Bloody Sabbath’.
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