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''The Nutcracker'' ((ロシア語:Щелкунчик, Балет-феерия) / ''Shchelkunchik, Balet-feyeriya''; (フランス語:Casse-Noisette, ballet-féerie)) is a two-act ballet, originally choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov with a score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (op. 71). The libretto is adapted from E.T.A. Hoffmann's story ''The Nutcracker and the Mouse King''. It was given its première at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg on Sunday, December 18, 1892, on a double-bill with Tchaikovsky's opera, ''Iolanta''.〔 Although the original production was not a success, the 20-minute suite that Tchaikovsky extracted from the ballet was. However, the complete ''Nutcracker'' has enjoyed enormous popularity since the late 1960s and is now performed by countless ballet companies, primarily during the Christmas season, especially in North America.〔Fisher, J. (2003). ''Nutcracker Nation: How an Old World Ballet Became a Christmas Tradition in the New World'', New Haven: Yale University Press.〕 Major American ballet companies generate around 40 percent of their annual ticket revenues from performances of ''The Nutcracker.'' Tchaikovsky's score has become one of his most famous compositions, in particular the pieces featured in the suite.〔Morin, A. (2001). ''The Third Ear Essential Listening Companion to Classical Music'', Backbeat Books.〕 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''. ==Composition== After the success of ''The Sleeping Beauty'' in 1890, Ivan Vsevolozhsky, the director of the Imperial Theatres, commissioned Tchaikovsky to compose a double-bill program featuring both an opera and a ballet. The opera would be ''Iolanta''. For the ballet, Tchaikovsky would again join forces with Marius Petipa, with whom he had collaborated on ''The Sleeping Beauty.'' The material Petipa chose was an adaptation of E.T.A. Hoffmann's story ''The Nutcracker and the Mouse King'' by Alexandre Dumas père called ''The Tale of the Nutcracker.''〔Anderson, J. (1958). ''The Nutcracker Ballet'', New York: Mayflower Books.〕 The plot of Hoffmann's story (and Dumas' adaptation) was greatly simplified for the two-act ballet. Hoffmann's tale contains a long flashback story within its main plot entitled ''The Tale of the Hard Nut'', which explains how the Prince was turned into the Nutcracker. This had to be excised for the ballet.〔Hoffmann, E.T.A., Dumas, A., Neugroschel, J. (2007). ''Nutcracker and Mouse King, and the Tale of the Nutcracker'', New York〕 Petipa gave Tchaikovsky extremely detailed instructions for the composition of each number, down to the tempo and number of bars.〔 The completion of the work was interrupted for a short time when Tchaikovsky visited the United States for twenty-five days to conduct concerts for the opening of Carnegie Hall. Tchaikovsky composed parts of ''The Nutcracker'' in Rouen, France.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Tchaikovsky )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Nutcracker」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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