Tony Iommi Performs At Ballet That Features Black Sabbath's Music

Tony Iommi, the legendary guitarist of Black Sabbath, pleasantly surprised punters attending Black Sabbath – The Ballet in the home of British heavy metal: Birmingham, United Kingdom.

The world premiere of Black Sabbath – The Ballet occurred on Saturday, 23 September, at the Hippodrome Theatre. Soundtracked to the iconic heavy metal band’s music, Iommi appeared towards the end of the night to play the guitar on Paranoid.

Blabbermouth reports that Iommi wasn’t the only figure of heavy metal royalty to attend the event, with fellow Black Sabbath member Geezer Butler and Sharon Osbourne attending the ballet. Led Zeppelin vocalist Robert Plant and Electric Light Orchestra’s Bev Bevan were also there.

Posting to social media yesterday (24 August), Iommi wrote about his appearance, “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.”

You can check out clips from the premiere of Black Sabbath – The Ballet below.

“I’m looking at our music differently now with this [the ballet] because it is being interpreted in a different way,” Iommi commented in a Birmingham World interview earlier this year. “It’s still got the basic things, but then it did have in the different orchestral things coming in and, and then I never thought for a minute, we would have people dancing to Black Sabbath and War Pigs and Iron Man! But here we are.”

In June, Iommi revealed that he knocked back a Black Sabbath reunion for the inaugural Power Trip festival. Ozzy Osbourne was scheduled to perform at the event, but due to health issues, pulled out and was replaced by heavy metal icons Judas Priest.

“It’s hard because Ozzy’s been going through a lot of stuff lately,” Iommi said. “He’s in hospital and out of hospital, and he’s really been fighting it; he really wants to get out there.

“But in my mind, it’s very difficult to sort of say yes. I’ve gotta think of the people in the band as well. I’ve gotta think of Ozzy: if he’s gonna be all right to do a show and whatever. So I wasn’t that comfortable with it.”

Power Trip will host Metallica, AC/DC, Guns N’ Roses, Tool, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden at the Indio, California home ground of Coachella from 6-8 October.