This Week at Lincoln Center, George Balanchine’s “The Nutcracker” begins the holiday season for the New York City Ballet.

In New York, we see a lot of ballet of all shapes and sizes. Seeing two of the country’s laureled companies at the Joyce Theater, from a relatively close distance, raises issues that continually simmer on the back burner.

Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet is having a bit of a moment these days, coming off of some big mainstream appearances. They were featured in the recent film "The Adjustment Bureau," as well as making a guest appearance on "So You Think You Can Dance."

In this edition of SundayArts: a visit to the School of American Ballet, a preview of Lincoln Center's Midsummer Night Swing, and the latest SundayArts News.

When George Balanchine said, "I don't want people who want to dance; I want people who have to dance” he was speaking about members of the New York City Ballet. To join their ranks takes unbelievable amounts of commitment, perseverance, and training. And, for most of these dancers, the training begins at the School of American Ballet.

Full-strength ballet fever hit New York this week, with American Ballet Theatre‘s two-month Metropolitan Opera House season joining New York City Ballet‘s Spring repertory already underway. So nearly every evening, and at three matinees, many thousands of ballet fans descend on Lincoln Center to soak it up. ABT’s emphasis at the Met is the full-length [...]

New York City Ballet’s ambitious six-week spring season got underway last week, a combo of repertory and seven commissioned premieres, including Alexei Ratmansky’s new ballet, Namouna, A Grand Divertissement. Perhaps the most anticipated ballet, it surpassed expectations and set the bar sky high for the remaining premieres. It showed Ratmansky’s ability to be inspired by, [...]

France’s Lyon Opera Ballet returned to the Joyce after 15 years with a wonderful program of works by Merce Cunningham, William Forsythe, and Maguy Marin, which runs through Mar 14. Even though none of these works were New York premieres, it was enormously gratifying to see them all together. Beach Birds (Cunningham) and Duo (Forsythe) [...]

Ballet can be a spectacle, but the big companies tend to sublimate this aspect in deference to emphasizing the classic stories, its rich history, the ever-present sublime beauty. So there’s something refreshing, if blunt, about the frank populist appeal of Kings of the Dance which took place at City Center last week. Produced by Ardani [...]

The Guggenheim Works & Process Emotion & Motion program on Feb 14 & 15 featured two top-ranking dancers (étoiles) from the Paris Opera Ballet—Clairemarie Osta and Mathieu Ganio—performing three ballet excerpts, plus the speaker Dr. Helen Fisher. Works & Process events usually trace a theme elucidated in dance performance excerpts, or preview an upcoming performance, [...]