The weather outside might be frightful, so why don't you come inside and enjoy a live performance at the Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State? From the traditional holiday favorite The Nutcracker to the immersive and multimedia spectacular What does PURPLE sound like?, there is something for everyone to take the chill out of the air this winter season.

The Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State has plenty of performances to choose from including:

• The Nutcracker
• What the Day Owes the Night
• A Choral Tribute to Martin Luther King, JR
• What does PURPLE sound Like?
• Lakecia Benjamin
• Circa
• Dear Evan Hansen
• The Addams Family
• David Lang's Before and After Nature

More information about each performance is listed below!

The Nutcracker

Performing Arts School of Central Pennsylvania Nittany Ballet
December 14, 2024 at 7 pm
December 15, 2024 at 2 pm
A beloved holiday tradition, Nittany Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker will transport you to a magical world where life-sized toy soldiers fight giant mice, snowflakes dance, and the Sugar Plum Fairy welcomes young Clara to the Nutcracker's kingdom to meet the characters from the Land of the Sweets.

What the Day Owes the Night

Compagnie Hervé Koubi
January 22, 2025 at 7:30 pm
Compagnie Hervé Koubi is a brotherhood of dancers primarily from North Africa, most with backgrounds in street dance. The internationally acclaimed performers combine expertise in capoeira, martial arts, hip-hop, and contemporary styles.

A Choral Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Elevation, Essence of Joy, Hatboro-Horsham High School Madrigals Choir, Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts School Concert Choir
January 24, 2025 at 7 pm
Performances will focus on choral and vocal music from African and African-American musical idioms that emphasize the legacy and influence of the late champion of civil and human rights. Elevation, a professional performing ensemble from Delaware, fuses traditional choral music with hip-hop, jazz, R&B, and spoken word.

What Does PURPLE Sound Like?

Sydnie L. Mosley Dances
February 4, 2025 at 7 pm
February 5, 2025 at 7 pm
February 6, 2025 at 2 pm
What Does PURPLE Sound Like? is a visual and performance art installation that celebrates the older adult communities throughout central Pennsylvania. The experience features local community participants in performance alongside SLMDances artists in excerpts from the dance company’s work PURPLE: A Ritual in Nine Spells.

Lakecia Benjamin

February 26, 2025 at 7:30 pm
Voted a 2020 DownBeat Critics Poll Rising Star, charismatic and dynamic saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin fuses traditional conceptions of jazz, hip-hop, and soul with her roots in Latin dance music. She has unleashed her electric presence and fiery sax work on stages with several legendary artists, including Stevie Wonder, Missy Elliott, Alicia Keys, and The Roots.

Circa - Duck Pond

Created by Yaron Lifschitz and the Circa Ensemble
March 22, 2025 at 7:30 pm
The Australian cirque company re-imagines the world’s most romantic ballet as a circus spectacular—featuring Tchaikovsky’s music paired with Circa’s signature physicality, cheeky humor, and thoroughly contemporary energy.

Dear Evan Hansen

March 27, 2025 at 7:30 pm
Evan Hansen is a high school student who always feels like he’s on the outside looking in. Evan finally gets what so many of us are searching for—the chance to fit in. What follows is a poignant, funny, and powerful musical about how even though it can be hard, we can find each other—and ourselves—along the way.

The Addams Family

April 1, 2025 at 7 pm
April 2, 2025 ay 7 pm
Wednesday Addams, the ultimate princess of darkness, has grown up and fallen in love with a sweet, smart young man from a respectable family—a man her parents have never met. If that weren’t upsetting enough, she confides in her father and begs him not to tell her mother. Now, Gomez Addams must do something he's never done before—keep a secret from his beloved wife, Morticia. Everything will change for the whole family on the fateful night they host a dinner for Wednesday’s “normal” boyfriend and his parents.

David Lang’s before and after nature

Performed by Bang on a Can All-Stars with the Penn State Concert Choir under the direction of Dr. Christopher Kiver
April 9, 2025 at 7:30 pm
before and after nature is a meditation on the natural world, both before human existence and after humans are gone. Lang set these texts for voices and Bang on a Can All-Stars, and he enlisted video pioneer Tal Rosner to invent a way to visualize the meanings of the music in video and projection. The result is an immersive spectacle of sound and vision, both heartbreaking and miraculous, full of beauty, wonder, and awe.

All performances will be held at Eisenhower Auditorium and for more information or to purchase tickets, visit the Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State.