Looking for something exciting to do this week? Check out VelocityDC’s Dance Picks for 12.09.09 – 12.13.09.

Got an event? Send it to us at velocitydc [at] gmail.com!

New York City Ballet

Time: December 12th & 13th at 1:30pm

Location: The Kennedy Center Opera House – 2700 F Street NW, Washington, DC

Cost: $29.00 – $99.00 Tickets and information available online at kennedy-center.org.

Two mixed repertory programs. One of the country’s most highly respected and healthiest ballet institutions, New York City Ballet returns to the Kennedy Center Opera House for seven performances comprised of two stunning mixed repertory programs. The company will perform works ranging from the classic grace of NYCB’s most legendary choreographers, George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins, to today’s inventive strides made by Christopher Wheeldon and Peter Martins.

The programs have been personally selected by Martins for the tremendous soloists and principals of New York City Ballet. Also to be performed is Dances at a Gathering, a landmark work by Balanchine’s longtime creative partner, Jerome Robbins. The meditative and sublimely entrancing Liturgy from Christopher Wheeldon shines amidst the Company’s repertoire. And former NYCB principal dancer and now Ballet Master in Chief Peter Martins offers his Les Gentilhommes, tying the company’s storied past to the present.

Metropolitan Ballet Theatre’s The Nutcracker

Time: December 12th & 13th at 1pm and 5pm

Location: Robert E. Parilla Performing Arts Center, Montgomery College – 51 Mannakee Street, Rockville, MD

Cost: $17.00-$22.00. Tickets available at www.montgomerycollege.edu/pac or call .  More info at mbtdance.org or call 301.762.1757.

Since 1989, Metropolitan Ballet Theatre has been presenting the full-length traditional staging of The Nutcracker. Year after year audiences are enchanted by MBT’s performances which feature fabulous dancing, a Christmas tree that seemingly grows forever, magical dancing dolls, marching toy soldiers, life size mice, a dazzling blizzard with dancing snowflakes, and a land of luscious sweets.

The Washington Ballet’s The Nutcracker

Time: December 10th -12th, 15th-19th, 22nd, 23rd, & 26th at 7pm

December 13th, 20th, 24th, & 27th at 1pm

December 12th, 19th, 23rd, 26th at 2pm

December 13th, 20th, & 27th at 5:30pm

Location: The Warner Theatre – 1299 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC

Cost: $20.00 and up. Tickets available at livenation.com.

Holiday cheer and history intersect in the lush world of Septime Webre’s The Nutcracker. Starring George Washington as the heroic Nutcracker and England’s King George III as the villainous Rat King, this whimsical delight is quickly becoming one of Washington DC’s newest holiday traditions. Secure your seats now for a taste of this “bonbon of a ‘Nutcracker,’ a bite-size sweet!” (The Washington Post)

The Floor is Sticky – Jane Franklin Dance

Time: December 12th at 8 pm & December 13th at 2 pm

Location: Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company - 641 D Street NW, Washington DC

Cost: Tickets available online at janefranklin.com or by phone at 703-933-1111.

The Floor is Sticky dances driven by poetry, spoken word and theatre

Eureka Dance Festival

Time: December 12th at 8pm & December 13rd at 7pm

Location: The Jack Guidone Theater – 5207 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington, DC

Cost: $10.00 students/children/seniors, $12.00 general admission. More info at dancefestival-eureka.org.

The 2009 Eureka Dance Festival: A weekend of new contemporary dance works by DC-based choreographers and international collaborating artists.Fueled by curiosity and risk, the Eureka Dance Festival is a choreographers’ stage to showcase new art and gain support through out the creative process. The 2009 Eureka Dance Festival Performance features the premier of Founder Kate Jordan’s “The Bicycle Project” and Co-Founder Orit Sherman’s “Sphere”, as well as pieces by Beth Loosemore, Sylvana Sandoz and Daniel Zook.

Saffron Winter Dance Concert

Time: December 12th at 5pm and 8pm

Location: Gonda Theatre, Davis Performing Arts Center at Georgetown University – 37th & O Streets NW, Washington, D.C.

Cost: $25.00 advance, $30.00 door. More  info at saffrondance.com or call 703.276.BELLY (2355).

Saffron Dance presents their winter concert, The Spice of Life: Dance Is the Journey. Performances by faculty and student companies.

Ballet Theatre of Maryland presents The Nutcracker

Time: December 12th at 7pm, December 13th & 20th at 1:30pm & 4:30pm

Location: Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts – 801 Chase Street, Annapolis, MD

Cost: Tickets available at tickets.marylandhall.org, balletmaryland.org, or call 410-263-8289 .

All of our Sunday performances feature our Sugar Plum Fairy parities for ticket holders.

Lesole Maine Dance Projects

Time: December 12th at 8pm & December 13th at 4pm

Location: Dance Place – 3225 8th Street NE, Washington, DC

Cost: $22.00 general admission; $17.00 members, seniors, students, teachers and artists; $8.00 children (17 and under). Tickets available at danceplace.org.

The premiere of two new works titled Nna and Without a Home. Nna part 1, mixes elements of African Rituals with the various styles of step taken from African American fraternities. Without a Home explores the life of the kids out in the streets of Johannesburg and in the United States of America.

Lesole Maine’s choreography reflects his experiences of living in South Africa and America as well as his eclectic dance backgrounds including modern dance, the Gumboots dance of South Africa and traditional dances of the Zulu people. The company, hailed by The Washington Post as bringing “powerful messages from the streets of South Africa.”

Form and Movement: Photographs by Philip Trager

Time: July 11, 2009 – January 3, 2010

Location: National Building Museum – 401 F St NW, Washington, DC

Cost: FREE

This exhibition features large-format black and white photographs selected from Philip Trager’s forty-year career. The exhibition brings together his extraordinary depictions of architecture, from Italian Renaissance villas to views of Paris and New York City streetscapes, with his later explorations of dance and the body. It reveals Trager’s overriding interest – whether picturing a Palladian villa or a dancer seemingly in flight – in illustrating symmetry and geometry, and exploring relationships between shapes, the play of light, and fluidity of form. Trager’s acclaimed work has been widely published and shown in numerous gallery and museum exhibitions.

Form and Movement is the culminating exhibition of the National Building Museum’s 2009 photography series.