Nutcracker help

[gtylers]

I am brand new to this forum and I'm hoping you experts can help.

For years the Cleveland are was very lucky to have San Jose Ballet in house for the Nutcracker productions and I attended with my family seasonally. For whatever reason their partnership ended and we went to a performance in Pittsburgh and it just wasn't the same.

Well, now Cleveland has the Cincinnati Ballet to do the Nutcracker this year, but we also could go see the Moscow Ballet or back to the Pittsburgh one again. Does anybody know which of these would be the best? I'd really just like to fly to San Jose because I have the fondest memories of seeing that one. Please help! I miss my Nutcracker! Thanks ahead of time.

[Helene]

I saw the Moscow Ballet perform Swan Lake in Portland. It was shortened a bit to accommodate multiple performances in one day (3pm and 7pm), but much more than just the essence of the ballet was there. It isn't a large company, but I enjoyed their performance of Swan Lake more than the Kirov/Maryinski's Sleeping Beauty. I loved the corps and felt they danced with life, and the principals were terrific. If Nutcracker is anything like Swan Lake, the company will involve local kids in the production, and the audience will have many friends and family of the performers in it. It's a smallish touring company, and the set consisted mostly of drops; I don't know if the Nutcracker sets will be similar, but the costumes for Swan Lake were gorgeous.

Cincinnati Ballet's Nutcracker has been choregraphed by Val Caniparoli, who used to dance for San Francisco Ballet and now performs character roles for the Company. His most known work is Lambarena, but that was in a different vein than Nutcracker. The sets and costumes are by Alain Vaes; I just saw a beautiful Romeo and Juliet designed by him. Sadly, we have no reviews of the production on Ballet Talk, and some of the more promising Google search results link to pages that are no longer active. I did find this 2004 review from the Cincinnati Post, which may be helpful.

I've never seen the Company perform, and I can't compare the dancing between the two companies, but I was bowled over by the Moscow Ballet. However, there's more to the Nutcracker than solo dancing, and the children in Cincinnati will have had a long rehearsal period and would be more organically integrated than in a production where individual rehearsal periods are shorter. If the sets are a large part of the magic for you and your family, it's almost certain that Cincinnati Ballet's will be more elaborate, since they don't have to tour the production.

[gtylers]

wow, thanks for all that info!