NUTCRACKER! Magical Christmas Ballet Tickets

It was all stunning. The costumes were unique & their details beautiful. All the dancers...children, teens & adults... kept you mesmerized with their graceful dancing. The music was the icing on the cake, completely perfect!

Dancers not in sync in scenes that could have been. In addition to not being very good overall. Only a few of the men and one woman were really good ballet dancers.

I went expecting to be dazzled by costumes and sets and see a real spectacle of a performance. The costumes and sets were nice, but average. The St. Louis Ballet uses prettier costumes (although I did love the mice in this one). I expected more Russian folklore touches, too. Really, there was the addition of the Snow Queen and Grandfather Frost, who were only in it for a few minutes, and that was about it. Of course the Russian Dance was good, but most regular productions have a good Russian Dance anyway. They made some other strange choices. There is a character of the Dove of Peace, who takes Masha (Clara) and the Prince to the Land of Peace or somesuch instead of the Land of Sweets. Which means that there was no Chocolate, Coffee, Tea, etc. They did those three dances but as Spain, Arabia, and China, plus the Russian dance for a total of four different countries represented bringing wishes for world peace and friendship. And the mice. Someone call an exterminator, because they just wouldn't die. Halfway through Act II, they're back! And then they came back again. What the heck??? Other bothersome points: The music was excessively loud--more like a movie than a ballet. The party scenes had some very good parts, but overall dragged quite a bit. Also, they incorporated dozens of local kids in various places, and I'm sure it was a thrill for them and their families, but I thought they really distracted from the professionals. It was very hard to watch the Snowflakes in particular. My little girl, who loves the Nutcracker, was bored and wanted to go home. She slept through most of Act II. I don't want to be completely negative, but these are things I wish I'd known. I did like some things. Drosselmeyer was great, they had some very engaging animal characters that they added with each of the different countries, and they did a nice job with the mice and the battle. And it wouldn't be fair to leave out that the dancing itself was very good in places (although uneven). But overall, I feel like now I'm going to have to buy tickets to see the St. Louis Ballet's production, because I don't feel like this gave me my Nutcracker fix for the year.

Moscow Ballet is dancing the Nutcracker--Yay! Saw it last year and it was FANTASTIC--Yay! Super excited, waiting to see a repeat of the Athletes, the Grace, The Beauty and what did we Get? A second rate school production of the Ballet with a bunch of crumb snatchers running around on stage, accompanying a too young Uncle D in an Our Town watered down version that was cringeworthy! If I pay for tickets to see the Moscow Ballet dance the Nutcracker, I expect to see just THAT, for they are World Renowned! I would no more want to see a bunch of children playing in the Super Bowl alongside the Professionals who were trying desperately to "cute it up" for someone. Definitely not for serious Patrons of the Dance! It was embarrassingly horrific! I have seen the Nutcracker in London, New York, Paris, Los Angeles, San Francisco--30 years of Sugar Plum Fantasy and this was the Worst Dance Performance I have EVER seen by any Dance Troupe, with the exception of My Kindergarten Class.

Moscow Ballet is dancing the Nutcracker--Yay! Saw it last year and it was FANTASTIC--Yay! Super excited, waiting to see a repeat of the Athletes, the Grace, The Beauty and what did we Get? A second rate school production of the Ballet with a bunch of crumb snatchers running around on stage, accompanying a too young Uncle D in an Our Town watered down version that was cringeworthy! If I pay for tickets to see the Moscow Ballet dance the Nutcracker, I expect to see just THAT, for they are World Renowned! I would no more want to see a bunch of children playing in the Super Bowl alongside the Professionals who were trying desperately to "cute it up" for someone. Definitely not for serious Patrons of the Dance! It was embarrassingly horrific!

I was extremely pleased to visit the Peabody for the first time, and the event was wonderful. It was remarkable to see the beauty and elegance, not to mention physical prowess, of those performing. I have always wanted to visit Moscow, and was very happy to see this particular event in my "own backyard".

As I had never been to a ballet performance, I had great expectations. My husband has been to see the Nutcracker 5 times and he said that this was the worst performance he had ever seen. I was not impressed and thought the professional dancers were doing just an okay performance. They missed several marks and seemed unsure of the stage size. There were a few stand out performances but overall I was not impressed. The children that were dancing were extremely cute and made me like the performance but I think if I see another ballet it will not be one that is performed by the Moscow Ballet!

Disjointed, too much distraction with large puppets and too many kids on stage. Poor level of dance except for principal dancers. Dancing too much like a circus acrobatic team. Looked like an amateur performance and the sets were terrible.

The show was full of athletic dancers and the story was simple enough for kids and grandpas to follow. Our seats were kind of pricy...just a couple rows back from the stage, but far left. So far left, that we could not see anything that took place on the left side of the stage because of the curtain being in the way. We only saw the center activity. Center seats are crucial to enjoy this show. Lots of kids in the show that really were just on stage to sell the seats to their adoring fans. It worked. Sold out the show, but not sure it added much to performance...

We really enjoyed this performance. The humor was a great addition. Painted backdrops were really great. The Arabian and Chinese dances were our favorites.

Great show. Disappointed with the program. Difficult to understand.

Dancers were excellent especially the children. The set design was sparce and uninspired. A shame that the music was canned.

Great dancers, sets and scenes.....a very entertaining evening!

When you jump into the air and land on the ground, what sound do you hear? Try it… Probably a loud thud! When you watch the Moscow Ballet's Great Russian Nutcracker dancers jump into the air with such balance and grace, they land like a feather on the wood floor! Visually the dancers are brilliant in their performance of a well know story and I would recommend this to all audiences young and old.

I have seen numerous performances of the Nutcracker, and this was the least impressive. The two lead dancers were the only saving grace. They were truly exceptional. The overall production with its piped in music and sparse settings was really disappointing. The dance of the sugar plums was great. The theme dances were sparsely populated and seemed trivial with the comic inclusion of the large bull. This was a marketing gimmick, since it featured local kids, whose parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents felt obliged to attend. Some of them were quite cute.

Both of us have seen The Nutcracker numerous times. This year, we took our children ages 10 & 6 to see it for the first time. We chose the Moscow Ballet over Joffery Ballet based on reviews stating that the Moscow Ballet stayed true to the original music. Here is why we were disappointed; 1) the music was a recording, 2) the scenery & special effects were bland and/or non-existent - read: the cannon made this sound "ppffft," 3) the second act, with the dances from around the world - usually some of the most exciting parts of the entire show (i.e. the Russian dance) - lacked the showmanship that is expected. Fortunately, the kids didn't know what they missed. Unfortunately, they now think The Nutcracker is "boring" and the ballet "stinks."

I hate to say it, but I feel conned. This should have been billed the Moscow JUNIOR ballet. Most of the dancers in major roles were quite young and just couldn't or didn't perform at the level we expected from a nationally billed company. The choreography was uninspiring - just not much spark until the very end. This was supposed to be a treat for my daughter and my parents, and instead I spent @$200 for "meh." Wish I'd gone to Joffrey instead. Oh, and the Public Hall stage is stunning, but the rest of it shabby and sad. The ushers were nice, though.

Quality was just ok.....the most annoying part of the performance was those ridiculous animals prancing around in the background of dancers . Very distracting and poorly costumed.

Lose all the local kids! They were distracting and not great. They were adorable but detracted from the professional dancers. Some parts of the ballet looked like a rehearsal. Dancers were off e floor marks and not lined up properly. A man in front of us had a ton of cologne on. It was overpowering and very cloying. It made us cough and sneeze.

The children, age 4 and 6, enjoyed the ballet very well.