Music #379 - Tchai - Nutcracker

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

 (1840 – 1893) 

The Nutcracker

For this 2-act ballet, Tchaikovsky chose Alexandre Dumas père's "Tale of the Nutcracker", which adapted Hoffmann's story "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King".

 full version

The Mariinsky Theater @ St. Petersburg
(formerly The Kirov Ballet of Leningad) 

The celesta is the defining, bell-like instrument of The Nutcracker, most famously used in the 

"Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy":

 

(L) Waltz of the Flowers

 

(R) Grand pas de deux - Adagio

(L) Russian Dance

 

(R) Arabian Dance