Mirabelle, 11, performs with the Royal Ballet at Christmas.

We year 7’s were looking forward to the “time of Nutcracker” and were all excited at the prospect of auditioning for a part; the Year Eights at White Lodge had talked about it “non-stop”. When I first found out I was going to be both gingerbread and a mouse I didn’t really know what to expect, I only knew that it was going to be fun. Rehearsals for gingerbreads started quite soon after. Once we had watched the previous gingerbreads we were then quickly taught the routine in the space of half an hour. I remember feeling even more baffled when it came to learning the mice: we were just plunged into the deep end with slightly odd phrases like: “from the odd three”, “glitter”, and learning it at the same time with no idea where we were supposed to be - fun nevertheless! Most evenings these rehearsals ended with a huge scrum to dinner as the whole of years seven, eight and nine finished rehearsals together.

The first time we went up to the Royal Opera House was incredibly exciting with a warm-up class there and then being led around the enormous building full of our “heroes” (and heroines!!!) We were brought into a studio where Mr. Carr (the ballet master) was sitting along with a lot of other important people (one day even the TV was there).

Gingerbreads went first, only four of us on stage with Drosselmeyer and Clara. We are meant to be scared of the mice trying to eat us so we jump around until Miss Gertrude comes to rescue us. We then after “much flapping” take refuge in a huge dolls house where we stay for the rest of the battle scene – observing the battle unfold. It’s all very exciting and a lot of fun especially when the house gets wheeled off-stage at the end. We then swapped casts so that meant I was a mouse. As I was the smallest of the mice I got the part where I had to jump onto the back of the Nutcracker during the battle, onto the back of a Royal Ballet Soloist - that was really scary! But we soon learned that everyone is incredibly friendly and that we are all in this together.

Later, when we tried on the costumes dancing was so much harder, not only wearing a mask which is difficult to see out of- but we also have to act twice as much than before to make it look good for the audience. Eventually, many, many studio rehearsals later it was time to try it out on the stage of the Royal Opera House – the biggest stage I have ever set foot on. Here we were given specific marks on the ground where to position ourselves otherwise it would be wrong and we would get a correction and would have to go through it all again.

Nutcracker is full of fun and nerves, when you’re about to go on for the first time the mind is just full of the possibilities that could go wrong - but of course they never happen... mostly (and if they do I am sure the audience never really notices)...

Written by Mirabelle Seymour aged 11.