A special dance gala has been planned to celebrate the work of the assistant director of Birmingham Royal Ballet Desmond Kelly before he retires.

The gala to honour Mr Kelly will take place in June.

Mr Kelly, who spearheaded last year’s Ballet Hoo! project, is retiring at the end of the 2007-08 season and the gala evening will feature a host of old friends and familiar faces.

BRB director David Bintley said: “Desmond Kelly’s great contribution to Birmingham Royal Ballet has been his loyalty and his dedication and that’s what I want this gala to reflect.

“We will be presenting an evening of interesting works that are relevant to Desmond, what he’s meant to the company and what he has achieved during his career. So it’s a question of getting absolutely the right people in the right roles and the right people to introduce different pieces, and to focus on old friends rather than famous people that he’s never met.”

He added: “Desmond has been a huge part of this company and I want it very much to feel like a company celebration as much as everything else.”

In January Mr Kelly and ballet mistress Marion Tait won a Critics’ Circle National Dance Award for the Ballet Hoo! project. It saw 60 youngsters from Dudley, Sandwell, Wolverhampton and Birmingham take part in 18 months of training to perform Romeo and Juliet at the Birmingham Hippodrome.

They were recruited through youth offending teams, schools and community projects and designed to help turn their lives around. Guests to the gala already confirmed include dancers Miyako Yoshida, Robert Parker and Joseph Cipolla, all old friends of Desmond and of Birmingham Royal Ballet, and further guests will be announced over the coming weeks.

Premium packages for the event, which will be held at the Birmingham Hippodrome on June 28, will be available during an initial priority booking period, before standard seats go on sale.