The Steadfast Tin Soldier is a short narrative ballet, staged as a pas de deux, that Balanchine set to Georges Bizet's Jeux d'enfants and based on Hans Christian Andersen's 1838 fairy tale about a tin soldier's love for a paper-doll ballerina. The version most commonly performed today was made in 1975 for New York City Ballet, premiering at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center with Patricia McBride and Peter Schaufuss.
What is danced
The article does not describe specific steps, holds, or vocabulary; what it establishes is the format — a pas de deux for two principals (the tin soldier and the paper-doll ballerina) rather than a corps work or full-length narrative ballet. It was built on Bizet's Jeux d'enfants score and given sets and costumes by David Mitchell, suggesting a toy-world design frame around the two dancers, but the article gives no further detail on how that frame shapes the choreography.
Because the movement itself is not described, a dancer preparing this role would need to consult the choreographic notation, a staged revival, or the 2014 NYCB video recording (Erica Pereira and Daniel Ulbricht) referenced in the article rather than this source alone.
Context
The 1975 pas de deux was not Balanchine's first use of this Bizet score: he had already choreographed Jeux d'enfants in 1955 in collaboration with Barbara Milberg and Francisco Moncion, danced by Melissa Hayden and Roy Tobias, and that piece was revived in 1959 with the choreography credited solely to Balanchine. The 1975 work was a fresh commission, made for Bizet's centennial and for the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, where NYCB performed annually — placing it within Balanchine's late-career pattern of turning to Andersen fairy tales, which he said attracted him for their 'underlying Christian substructure.'
Staging history
The ballet premiered July 30, 1975, at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center with New York City Ballet dancers Patricia McBride and Peter Schaufuss, and reached New York City the following year. In 2020, during pandemic-era closures, NYCB released a 2014 video recording of the ballet featuring Erica Pereira and Daniel Ulbricht, making that performance the most accessible modern reference point.
How to watch it
Watch it as a two-person narrative miniature rather than a divertissement: the drama of the Andersen story (soldier and doll, love and separation) has to be carried entirely by the pas de deux and by David Mitchell's sets and costumes, without a corps to frame it. Compare stagings against the 2014 NYCB recording circulated in 2020, since the article gives no earlier film reference point.
Credits
- composer: Georges Bizet