George Balanchine’s production of The Nutcracker, choreographed in 1954 for the six-year-old New York City Ballet, is lovingly rooted in the original Mariinsky production. Balanchine, who’d been a student at the Mariinsky, knew the ballet well, and his Nutcracker is both musically true and theatrically eloquent. Pennsylvanians have been blessed with this production as well. Barbara Weisberger, who founded the Pennsylvania Ballet in 1963, was the first student that Mr. B accepted into his School of American Ballet, back in 1934. She became an influential teacher and was a visionary director, and she always kept in touch with George. Hence the company—now called the Philadelphia Ballet—has strong ties to N.Y.C.B. The present director is the charismatic Angel Corella, formerly a star dancer at American Ballet Theatre. —Laura Jacobs