New York City Ballet’s “George Balanchine The Nutcracker®” (1954)at the David H. Koch Theater in Lincoln Center is New York’s big classical Nutcracker production.
New York is blessed with many wonderful smaller productions, but this is the one. It’s the very ballet that popularized “The Nutcracker.” It was an obscure ballet before. The ballerina who created the role of Marie was New York City Ballet’s first prima ballerina, Indigenous American Maria Tallchief.
Today “The Nutcracker” is the ballet that pays the bills for ballet companies around the world. It all started here in New York City with Mr. B at City Ballet.
NYC Ballet “The Nutcracker” 2022
New York City Ballet presents “George Balanchine, The Nutcracker” at the David H Koch Theater from Friday, November 25 – Saturday, December 31, 2022.
2021 Nutcracker
City Ballet’s “Nutcracker” will be performed from Friday, November 26, 2021 – Sunday, January 2, 2022. Performances were cut short by the COVID-19 Omicron surge.
2020 Nutcracker
To keep everyone safe during the COVID-19 Pandemic, NYC Ballet’s 2020 “Nutcracker” was cancelled. You can stream a past performance at nycballet.com
2019 Nutcracker
New York City Ballet’s “George Balanchine The Nutcracker” was at the David H. Koch Theater in Lincoln Center from Friday, November 29 to January 5, 2019.
The ballet generally runs Tuesday through Sunday. Tickets go on sale in early September.
The First Black Marie
City Ballet made ballet history in 2019 by casting Charlotte Nebres as the first Black child Marie.
Isn’t it wonderful how great art predicts the future? In 2019, nobody could have foreseen that in six months Black Lives Matter would become one of America’s most pressing social issues. But this is how great art works. It’s almost like it has a mind of its own. Thank you City Ballet for understanding how important it is to be able to see yourself up on stage.
2018 Nutcracker
NYC Ballet’s “The Nutcracker” ran Tuesday-Sunday from November 23 to December 30, 2018.
2017 Nutcracker
NYC Ballet’s “The Nutcracker” ran from November 25 to December 31, 2017.
City Ballet’s “George Balanchine The Nutcracker®” is America’s Big Nutcracker
The NYCB Nutcracker is a big production. Tschaikovsky’s score and Balanchine’s choreography are presented by 90 dancers, 62 musicians, 32 stagehands and a rotating cast of 50 students from New York City Ballet’s School of American Ballet.
New York City Ballet turns us all back into children with a one-ton Christmas tree that grows from 12 feet to 40 feet right before your eyes. The costume for Mother Ginger, the dancer with all those children under her dress, weighs 85 pounds, is nine feet wide, and requires a stage crew of three. Somehow they keep all those snowflakes white through 47 performances.
New York City Ballet Popularized “The Nutcracker”
New York City Ballet is the company that turned an obscure work, “The Nutcracker,” into the world’s most popular ballet.
Native American dancer Maria Tallchief was America’s first prima ballerina. She is from the Osage Nation. Her grace and her husband (at the time) George Balanchine’s choreography, together made “The Nutcracker” the world’s most popular ballet.