In celebration of its 80th anniversary, the Yocum Institute for Arts Education, in partnership with BerksCatholicHigh School, will debut an exciting new take on an old favorite, “The Nutcracker”. The production will take place at Berks Catholic on December 12th and 13th of 2014. The synergy will reflect the talent in a culturally diverse production of our version of the Nutcracker called “The Nutcracker Twist”. 

We expect to involve a cast of fifty dancers, and other talented professionals including musicians and visual artists who will have the opportunity to benefit from this communal artistic experience. The students will have an authentic experience on stage with two performances and an attendance to top 1,500 viewers. This story infuses salsa, tap, jazz, ballet, and hip-hop while taking Klara from her holiday party into her dream world! She will find herself swirling among snowflakes and princesses while envisioning herself as a grown woman on her wedding day! While fusing these departments, many dance styles, and collaborating together, we feel this will be a wonderful opportunity for the youth of our community to grow and develop as future artists and reach their potential goals. We will be able to expose them and the audience to live music, and dance, while giving them a professional performing opportunity. It is important to foster these young, aspiring actors, dancers, musicians and artists at an early age, and give them these extraordinary performance opportunities.