The Nutcracker Ballet

November 30, 2025 3:00 pm

Tickets:$18.05 - $39.56

Fall in love with Tchaikovsky’s great ballet The Nutcracker, all over again with the Ithaca Ballet. Cindy Reid serves as Artistic Director with Choreography by Lavinia Reid. Experience classic pieces such as March of the Toy Soldiers, Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy, and Waltz of the Flowers. The Nutcracker will usher in the holiday spirit for the whole family—you won’t want to miss this!

The Ithaca Ballet:
Under the direction of Cindy Reid, the Ithaca Ballet is the longest running performing arts group in Tompkins County. The Ithaca Ballet’s mission is sharing the art of classical and contemporary ballet with the widest audience possible in upstate New York. In its over 50 years of existence, the ballet has trained thousands of young people in the art of dance. The quality of instruction and performance experience provided by the ballet is of a caliber that alumni of the Ithaca Ballet have gone on to professional careers as professional dancers in prominent companies around the world, including American Ballet Theatre, Alvin Ailey, the Joffrey Ballet, the Miami City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet and Wiener Staatsballett.

Sonia Dvořák has been dancing professionally for the past fourteen years and was most recently engaged as a Soloist with the Vienna State Ballet. She received her training at the Ithaca Ballet and Canada’s National Ballet School before going on to hold Soloist positions with the Deutsche Oper am Rhein and Ballett Kiel, while touring extensively throughout Japan, Taiwan, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and Russia. Dvořák has created numerous original roles with choreographers such as Martin Schläpfer, Alexei Ratmansky, and Cathy Marston, and has performed principal roles in works by George Balanchine, William Forsythe, Ohad Naharin, Jiří Kylián, Marco Goecke, Hans van Manen, and August Bournonville, among others. Her repertoire includes leading roles in The Sleeping Beauty (Martin Schläpfer), La Fille mal gardée (Frederick Ashton), Onegin (John Cranko), and Don Quixote (Rudolf Nureyev).

Darwin Black of Newark, New Jersey started his dancing at the age of 16. In 2006, he graduated from Newark Arts High School under the direction of Ronnie D. Carney and Kim Richardson. Darwin furthered his training under Nancy Turano with the New Jersey Dance Theatre Ensemble. Darwin trained for a year at Alvin Ailey American Dance as a Fellowship Student under the Oprah Winfrey Scholarship.
He began his professional career with the Miami City Ballet As an apprentice. Darwin later joined The Sacramento Ballet, performing ballets by George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp, Trey McIntyre and Matthew Neenan, to name a few.
After three years with The Sacramento Ballet, he joined Pascal Rioult Dance Theater, dancing and touring throughout the United States. Mr. Black danced as a freelance artist for Dance Lab NYC, Alaska Dance Theatre, Lustig Dance Theatre, Montgomery Ballet and Nimbus Dance Works, and he toured throughout Europe with Momix. Darwin later joined TU Dance under the leadership of Toni-Pierce Sands & Uri Sands. For four seasons he danced World premiere works by Uri Sands, Francesca Harper, Kyle Abraham, Gioconda Barbuto, and Katrin Hall.
Darwin is spreading his wings into Choreography. His first Original work by the Saint Paul Ballet “OFF THE BASE” premiered at The Cowles Center March of 2017. In October of 2017, he premiered “N.L.I.F” (Never Live In Fear) for Minnesota Dance Theatre.
Darwin performed in the musical “Sentimental Journey” at mountain theatre playhouse.

Box Office, Tickets and Seating:
The Smith’s box office will be open for in person or over-the-phone sales Tuesday-Friday from 10am-4pm. Online tickets can be purchased at any time. All over the phone or online purchases will receive a digital ticket sent to your email. You must have a valid email to purchase tickets for this event. Our box office can be reached at 315-781-5483 or boxoffice@thesmith.org.