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A Nutcracker For The Southwest

www.festivalballetabq.org

It was 1954 when George Balanchine summoned up memories of a festive holiday ballet from his Russian boyhood and remounted the production for the New York City Ballet.  Ever since, The Nutcracker has been a holiday tradition around the U.S.  There are several versions of Tchaikovsky's classic on stage this season in New Mexico, and one of them sets the story right here, in the New Mexico Territory of the 19th Century. 

Choreographer Patricia Dickinson Wells, Artistic Director of Festival Ballet Albuquerque, talks about the company's Nutcracker in the Land of Enchantment, on stage December 19-21 at the National Hispanic Cultural Center.  For information, visit http://festivalballetabq.org/.

Spencer Beckwith reports on the arts for KUNM. For ten years, until March of 2014, Spencer was the producer and host of KUNM's "Performance New Mexico," a weekday morning arts program that included interviews with musicians, writers and performers. Spencer is a graduate of the acting program at the Juilliard School, and, before moving to New Mexico in 2002, was for many years a professional actor based in New York City.