It's been 32 years since the Royal Ballet last performed Jerome Robbins's Dances at a Gathering, and I suppose it's something of a coup to have it back in the Covent Garden repertoire. But my feelings about Robbins's 1969 creation (he made it for New York City Ballet) are mixed. Free from artifice and unrestrained by plot, it's a wonderful opportunity for dancers to be themselves. But, running at just over an hour and with no real sense of momentum, it does go on.

Set to 18 of Chopin's works for solo piano (played here with enthusiasm and stamina by Philip Gammon), Robbins's choreography is a celebration of movement and music that reimagines five ballet couples (identified by the colour of their costumes) as participants at a social dance. Folk accents bring the sophisticated classical technique down to earth, while bubbles of humour help to lighten the mood.

One wishes there had been more larking about, for too much of the ballet drags with earnest sentiment and drifting wisps of nostalgia. The dreamy female trio - ballerinas posed like the Three Graces - is a Hallmark moment we could well do without. But the Royal Ballet cast imbue the choreography with the easy flow of beautiful dancing and strongly etched personalities.

The men, with their peacock jigs and vain frivolities, have a better time of it than the women, none more so than Johan Kobborg, who, as the main attraction in the first cast, was outstanding in every guise. Alina Cojocaru fluttered with impetuous delight; in her pas de deux with Kobborg she was like a bird in flight. Tamara Rojo and Federico Bonelli offered a blissful pairing. Sarah Lamb was flirtatious, Laura Morera insouciant, and Lauren Cuthbertson wonderfully vivacious. Tonight, in an unusual move for a company that these days rarely brings in female guest artists from abroad, Yvonne Borree, a principal with New York City Ballet, is being flown over to join the second cast.

Dances at a Gathering is coupled with The Dream (1964), Frederick Ashton's luminous distillation of Shakespeare. Set to Mendelssohn's delightful music and brimming with choreographic wit and charm, it's quite rightly one of the jewels in the Royal crown.

Roberta Marquez, making her debut as Titania, offered a creditable performance without quite touching the heart. Ivan Putrov, as Oberon, presented a neat package of technical and dramatic skill but lacked the charismatic stature of the great Oberons. Far happier were the lovers, especially Rupert Pennefather's Lysander. Who knew he had it in him to be a rom-com star?

At the Saturday matinee, injury stopped play when Ludovic Ondiviela's Puck hobbled off in evident pain. Within minutes, a substitute Puck had been found in the person of James Wilkie, who luckily had wandered back into the theatre after shopping in Covent Garden. It's hard to jump into a ballet mid-flow but Wilkie - making an unscheduled debut in the role - handled it brilliantly.

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