Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker” premieres at…

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker” premieres at at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg, Russia, on December 18 1892.

A two-act ballet, originally choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov, the libretto is adapted from E. T. A. Hoffmann's story "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King".

Although the original production is not a success, the twenty-minute suite that Tchaikovsky extracts from the ballet is.

However, the complete Nutcracker will enjoyed enormous popularity since the late 1960s and is now performed by countless ballet companies, primarily during the Christmas season, especially in North America.

Major American ballet companies generate around forty percent of their annual ticket revenues from performances of The Nutcracker.

The ballet's score will be used in several film adaptations of Hoffmann's story.

Tchaikovsky's score has become one of his most famous compositions.

Among other things, the score is noted for its use of the celesta, an instrument that the composer had already employed in his much lesser known symphonic ballad The Voyevoda.