After our lovely meal at De Santos, we went to see the New York Ballet's The Nutcracker at the Lincoln Center for Abi's Christmas present...
Abi had no idea we were going, so it was a great surprise when the taxi pulled up outside the Lincoln Center. The Lincoln Center itself is a beautiful place, we'd never been there but we'd been passed in a bus once, so it was great to finally be there...
It was really busy with people going to see the Nutcracker, but also the other plays that are on at the moment - I think Warhorse is one of them. There were lots of people in their theatre finery, including us!
Once we got in the theatre, we went to find our seats - I was a little worried that we'd have a rubbish view as we were on the very top balcony, but I don't think it's possible to have a bad view in that place. It turned out we were on the very very back row, but it didn't matter, we could see everything perfectly... once we got passed the vertigo!
I'd never been to a ballet before, and it had been ages since Abi had been - so it was very exciting sitting there waiting for the performance to begin. Also, when Abi was 10 she was the lead flower in dance of the flowers, so we were both looking forward to see if the New York Ballet were as good as Abi!
The whole thing was absolutely amazing, some of the production was so so clever. It starts with the two children who have fallen asleep on a chair outside their sitting room. There's a big wall behind them with the sitting room door on it, then as the children look through the key hole into the sitting room, the wall became transparent! It revealed the beautiful Christmas tree in the sitting room behind the door.
There were some other very clever bits - when the Marie (the little girl) gets shrunk down to toy size, the Christmas tree in the sitting room starts to grow, and grow, and grow, and GROW! It went on forever, getting higher and higher and wider and wider, all coming out from underneath of the stage! It reminded me of the Radio City Hall tour we went on when the explained how much space there is below stage and in the ceiling. It was so clever.
The dancing was amazing too. All the children were fantastic and the music was absolutely incredible. I think Act 2 was by far my favourite, when they have all the different dances, and all the short snippets of music - I think the dance of the candy canes is one of my favourite pieces of classical music ever.
I'd never been to a ballet before, and it had been ages since Abi had been - so it was very exciting sitting there waiting for the performance to begin. Also, when Abi was 10 she was the lead flower in dance of the flowers, so we were both looking forward to see if the New York Ballet were as good as Abi!
The whole thing was absolutely amazing, some of the production was so so clever. It starts with the two children who have fallen asleep on a chair outside their sitting room. There's a big wall behind them with the sitting room door on it, then as the children look through the key hole into the sitting room, the wall became transparent! It revealed the beautiful Christmas tree in the sitting room behind the door.
There were some other very clever bits - when the Marie (the little girl) gets shrunk down to toy size, the Christmas tree in the sitting room starts to grow, and grow, and grow, and GROW! It went on forever, getting higher and higher and wider and wider, all coming out from underneath of the stage! It reminded me of the Radio City Hall tour we went on when the explained how much space there is below stage and in the ceiling. It was so clever.
The dancing was amazing too. All the children were fantastic and the music was absolutely incredible. I think Act 2 was by far my favourite, when they have all the different dances, and all the short snippets of music - I think the dance of the candy canes is one of my favourite pieces of classical music ever.
Some of the dancers were incredible, balancing of their tiptoes for ages, and at one point, when The Sugarplum Fairy and Her Cavalier were doing their dance near the end - the Sugarplum Fairy went up on one foot, on the very tips of her toes (or on point as my ballerina tells me it's called!) and stayed perfectly still as the Cavalier pulled her along. She glided so smoothly on her toes... I still don't understand how she did it - there were gasps in the audience as they did it. We've not practiced it at home yet, but I think we might tonight!
It was a really special night and a wonderful start to our Christmas!
It was a really special night and a wonderful start to our Christmas!
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