From 3 to 7 January 2012 Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra and Opera Company will tour to the Near East, visiting Istanbul and Eilat

On 31 December Maria Shirinkina will be performing the role of Masha in Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Nutcracker for the first time (choreography by Vasily Vainonen).

The December tour by the Mariinsky Ballet Company and Orchestra under the baton of maestro Gergiev to major Spanish cities including Valencia, Barcelona and Madrid has proved a tremendous success

From 27 to 31 December the Mariinsky Ballet Company will be undertaking its first ever tour to Muscat, the capital of Oman

Two recent Mariinsky label recordings – Gaetano Donizetti’s opera Lucia di Lammermoor and Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies – continue to garner reviews in the international press

Valery Gergiev will be conducting the Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra in performances of Gustav Mahler’s Seventh Symphony in Moscow and St Petersburg

On 16 December Konstantin Ivkin will be making his debut as the Bluebird

15 December will see young soloists Ekaterina Goncharova and Irina Shishkova making their debuts as Tatiana and Olga in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s opera Eugene Onegin

The December 2011 – January 2012 issue of France’s Classica magazine has explained its choice of Valery Gergiev as “Artist of the Year”

From 21 – 27 December the Mariinsky Ballet Company will undertake its traditional pre-New Year tour to Baden-Baden in Germany