One of these years I’ll make it to see a live performance of The Nutcracker. Until then, this can suffice:
Don’t have time for the whole thing? Here’s the Suite that Tchaikovsky arranged. I played this every year in college, and it’s one of few pieces of music that has a very strong time-and-place association for me.
I saw the Nutcracker twice in one day three years ago. the daughter was in the 2nd show, and she wanted to see the first one. BRUTAL. I've seen it 5 times now. It'll be a while before I watch it again.