Even before the show begins you can see that the Albert Hall, festooned with fairylights, is ready to party. And when the band strikes up its first Gershwin melody the festive mood is assured. This latest collaboration between English National Ballet and the choreographer Derek Deane is clearly determined to give its audience a good time and that's exactly what it does.

Deane's glitzy song-and-dance tribute to the golden age of the American musical is aimed at a big and diverse audience. Not only aficionados of George and Ira Gershwin's legendary partnership, but also the multitude of armchair fans who followed Strictly Come Dancing on the telly and will no doubt be delighted to find two of its stars among the lineup. Add in the presence of the outstanding Gareth Valentine (as musical supervisor) and the incomparable Barbara Cook, queen of cabaret singers, and the seal is set on the evening's exemplary musical credentials.

Deane throws everything into the choreographic mix - ballet, ballroom, tap - as one number after another trades on the Gershwin magic. Some of it is bland, even cheesy, and you can quibble about the giant video screens that flash up icons of the silver screen, or indeed about the opening ballet class, which seems rather pointless. But overall this is a sleek and hugely enjoyable production that celebrates some of the greatest popular music of the 20th century.

High on my list of favourites is The Man I Love, beautifully danced by Agnes Oaks and Thomas Edur, who delivered Deane's bittersweet duet with an illuminating aura of romance, so intimately convincing despite the hall's huge space. Edur moves like a dream; Oaks with the cool beauty of a Grace Kelly. Shall We Dance is the clichéd Hollywood pastiche, a ballroom swirl with the women in ermine and silver heels and the men in tails. Elena Glurdjidze, as the ballerina in the middle, took to its frothy mood as if she had been dancing like that all her life. Summertime showcased another ENB ballerina, Daria Klimentova, in a tender duet with Friedemann Vogel, a guest from Stuttgart who also partnered Glurdjidze. Meanwhile, the energetic tap dancing duo of Douglas Mills and Paul Robinson - and the Strictly Come Dancing stars Lilia Kopylova and Darren Bennett - brought the glamour of showbiz to the event, proving that if you've got it flaunt it.

If you didn't know the film, you might be baffled by Deane's whimsical take on An American in Paris, though you couldn't argue with the quality of the dancing. Guillaume Côté (a guest from the National Ballet of Canada) was irresistible as the American GI who finds love abroad; Tamara Rojo (a Royal Ballet principal) was wonderfully lissom as his French lovely. Rhapsody in Blue, which ends the programme, is a chic and bubbly ballet, Deane at his buoyant best. On the first night it featured Rojo as a regal classicist; her dancing was filled with luscious confidence and creamy phrasing. Côté was so nimble and handsome it made you wish we saw him more often. Throughout, the costumes (by Roberta Guidi di Bagno) are a fabulous parade of colour and style. No less fabulous is Valentine's exuberant conducting. And to hear Cook in any setting is an ecstatic pleasure. Her four heartfelt songs capture Gershwin like no one else.

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