The newspapers were divided on the ballet's value. The "St. Petersburg Gazette" wrote "this ballet is the most tedious thing ever seen ... a long way from what ballet music should be." The "St. Petersburg News-sheet" wrote, "It is hard to say which number is the greatest, for everything from start to finish is beautiful." "The New Age" wrote that Tchaikovsky's orchestral writing was the work of genius. A ballet lover thought "The Nutcracker" was the greatest of the three ballets Tchaikovsky had written.