From an imperial-era Russian Christmas party, a young girl named Clara is whisked in her dreams to an imaginary world populated by the animated creations of the wizard toy maker Drosselmeier. Clara innocently develops a crush on the imaginary Nutcracker prince. Upon her arrival in the Land of the Sweets, she dances a yearning pas de deux with the Nutcracker Prince. It makes the ballet far more interesting. The frequent involvement of Drosselmeyer...

This tale of a prince, a beautiful swan princess and an evil sorcerer begins in a woodland clearing far, far away. It is Prince Siegfried's 21st birthday. He is playing games with his friends when his mother, the Queen, arrives to tell him he needs to stop having fun and start looking after the kingdom. Prince Siegfried dreams of running away. He follows an enchanting flock of swans to a clearing by a lake, where four of the little cygnets begin to...

The Russian artists Igor Stravinsky and Vaslav Nijinsky were popular in their time: Stravinsky for music, Nijinsky for dance. When their radically new ballet, The Rite of Spring, was first performed in Paris on May 29, 1913, the reaction was so polarized, there were fistfights and riots! Brilliant or disastrous, the performance marked the birth of modern music and dance. Stringer's rhythmic text and gloriously inventive, color-rich paintings capture...

"Explore the dreamlike world of Rudolf Nureyev's interpretation of The Nutcracker. In his imaginative retelling of a 19th-century classic, the young Clara is propelled by dark forces from the realm of childhood into a radiant kingdom where she takes centre stage. With a striking psychoanalytic dimension to the traditional festive favourite, Clara's surreal journey becomes an allegory for the hopes and dreams of a young girl on the cusp of adulthood"--Container...