The Nutcracker is an 1892 two-act ballet, originally choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov with a score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto is adapted from E. T. A. Hoffmann's 1816 short story "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King".
New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company's first music director. City Ballet grew out of earlier troupes: the Producing Company of the School of American Ballet, 1934; the American Ballet, 1935, and Ballet Caravan, 1936, which merged into American Ballet Caravan, 1941; and directly from the Ballet Society, 1946.
William Forsythe is an American dance and choreographer resident in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. He is known for his work with the Ballet Frankfurt (1984–2004) and The Forsythe Company (2005–2015). Recognized for the integration of ballet and visual arts, which displayed both abstraction and forceful theatricality, his vision of choreography as an organizational practice has inspired him to produce numerous installations, films, and web-based knowledge creation, incorporating the spoken word and experimental music.
Jerome Robbins was an American choreographer, director, dancer, and theater producer who worked in classical ballet, on stage, film, and television.
The Firebird is a ballet and orchestral concert work by the Russian-born composer Igor Stravinsky. It was written for the 1910 Paris season of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes company. The original choreography was by Michel Fokine, who collaborated with Alexandre Benois on a scenario based on the Russian fairy tales of the Firebird and the blessing and curse it possesses for its owner. Its premiere at the Opéra de Paris on 25 June 1910 was an immediate success, catapulting Stravinsky to international fame.
The Joffrey Ballet is one of the premier dance companies and training institutions in the world today. Located in Chicago, Illinois, the Joffrey regularly performs classical and contemporary ballets during its annual performance season at Lyric Opera House, including its annual presentation of The Nutcracker.
Contemporary ballet is a genre of dance that incorporates elements of classical ballet and modern dance. It employs classical ballet technique and in many cases classical pointe technique as well, but allows greater range of movement of the upper body and is not constrained to the rigorously defined body lines and forms found in traditional, classical ballet. Many of its attributes come from the ideas and innovations of 20th-century modern dance, including floor work and turn-in of the legs. The style also contains many movements emphasizing the bodies flexibility.
Alberta Ballet was founded by Muriel Taylor and Dr. Ruth Carse in 1958 and became a professional company in 1966. The company is a resident company of both the Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium in Edmonton, Alberta and the Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium in Calgary, Alberta and performs its full season in both venues.
The Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre is an American professional ballet company based in the Strip District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and United States.
Christopher Peter Wheeldon OBE is an English international choreographer of contemporary ballet.
Carolina Ballet is one of America’s premier arts organizations, programming traditional ballets by legendary masters and new works by contemporary choreographers. The Ballet was launched as a professional company in 1998 under the direction of Founding Artistic Director Robert Weiss. In 2019, Zalman Raffael became the Artistic Director/CEO joined by Michele Weathers as Executive Director. For more than 20 years, Carolina Ballet has garnered critical praise from the national and international media, staged over 100 world premiere ballets, and in 2018, chartered the School of Carolina Ballet. Since its inaugural season in 1998, Carolina Ballet and this community have accomplished something remarkable. The Company has grown from a budget of $1.2 million featuring sixteen dancers and five apprentices in three programs to a $6.0 million budget featuring 38 dancers in eight programs including the magical holiday tradition, The Nutcracker.
The Hong Kong Ballet (香港芭蕾舞團) is a classical ballet company founded in 1979.
Apollo is a neoclassical ballet in two tableaux composed between 1927 and 1928 by Igor Stravinsky. It was choreographed in 1928 by twenty-four-year-old George Balanchine, with the composer contributing the libretto. The scenery and costumes were designed by André Bauchant, with new costumes by Coco Chanel in 1929. The scenery was executed by Alexander Shervashidze, with costumes under the direction of Mme. A. Youkine. The American patron of the arts Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge had commissioned the ballet in 1927 for a festival of contemporary music to be held the following year at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
Ballet Society is a non-profit educational institution founded in 1946 by Lincoln Kirstein and George Balanchine. At its founding, Balanchine was the Artistic Director and Kirstein served as the Secretary. The president of Ballet Society is Nancy Lassalle, an original Board member of both the School of American Ballet and the New York City Ballet, currently Emerita.
Northern Ballet, formerly Northern Ballet Theatre, is a dance company based in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, with a strong repertoire in theatrical dance productions where the emphasis is on story telling as well as classical ballet. The company tours widely across the United Kingdom.
Benjamin Millepied is a French dancer and choreographer, who has lived and worked in the United States after joining the New York City Ballet in 1995, where he became a soloist in 1998 and a principal in 2002. He has also created choreography for the company, and choreographed pieces for other major companies. He retired from NYCB in 2011.
The Four Temperaments or Theme and Four Variations is an orchestral work and ballet by Paul Hindemith. Although it was originally conceived as a ballet for Léonide Massine, the score was ultimately completed as a commission for George Balanchine, who subsequently choreographed it as a neoclassical ballet based on the theory of the four temperaments.
Ballet Hispánico is an American dance company based in Manhattan, New York. It was founded by the Puerto Rican/Mexican-American dancer and choreographer Tina Ramirez in 1970 and presents dances reflecting the experience of Hispanic and Latino Americans. It describes itself as "the foremost dance representative of Hispanic culture in the United States."
The Oklahoma City Ballet is a professional dance company and school located in Oklahoma City. The company began under the artistic direction of Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo dancers Yvonne Chouteau and Miguel Terekhov in the Science and Arts Foundation building on the Oklahoma City Fairgrounds,
Los Angeles Ballet (LAB) is a classical ballet company based in Los Angeles. While rehearsals take place at the Los Angeles Ballet Center, the company tours venues across LA County, such as the Dolby Theatre and Royce Hall, during its performances. LAB typically hosts two classical ballets each season, with an additional Balanchine performance in the spring. The company was founded and is co-directed by husband-and-wife team Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary. The company debuted December 2006 with an original performance of The Nutcracker.