182 replies to this topic

[Buddy]

I just received an email from Ms Part who said she sustained an injury in class this morning and would not be able to appear in the rest of the season. She did not elaborate and the email was apparently sent to all who had emailed her in the past... as it was addressedwith the salutation: "Friends".

Never a good thing when this happens. Hope she has a speedy recovery.

The message was apparently sent to four of us. I also join SanderO in wishing her a quick recovery. If anyone wishes to e-mail her their good wishes it can be done at...

vpartnyc@gmail.com

[Buddy]

Clement Crisp has rediscoverd Veronika Part and what a rediscovery it is !

"Symphonie concertante....it was the presence of Veronika Part (as the viola’s representative) who brought the piece, and the evening, to glory.

"We remember her as a young divinity with the Mariinsky Ballet – her Lilac Fairy sublime – and the dignity and amplitude of her St Petersburg style, the voluptuous, luscious grace of her every action, pouring some noble and heady wine for us, breathed life, meaning, into her role. "

http://www.ft.com/cm...00779e2340.html

Welcome back, Veronika Part !

(PS Please don't forget to read about Tamara Rojo as just mentioned in this topic ("Dancers") by leonid)

[Haglund's]

I noted on the ABT website that Veronika has been given a Detroit Swan Lake performance on March 18th with Gomes!

[Buddy]

I noted on the ABT website that Veronika has been given a Detroit Swan Lake performance on March 18th with Gomes!

Hi Haglund,

You may have been aware that I live in the Detroit area. If so thank you.

I may not be in Detroit at the time, but will really try to be. If so I will definitely try and tell Ballet Talk all about the performance. Would you hazard a guess as to the probability of Veronika Part actually appearing that day ?

(spelling error later corrected)

[Haglund's]

Buddy, I had the feeling you lived in the area, and that you would be very pleased with this news.

Barring injury, I see no reason why Veronika will not appear on March 18th as scheduled. I generally check the ABT casting web pages daily for changes; so, I will let this board know if anything changes on their site. My only concern is that the Motor City will experience a meltdown from the heat generated by this Part-Gomes performance. You should try, by all means, to get to this performance and take all of your important friends and relatives. You do not want to miss this Swan Lake. I repeat, you do not want to miss this.

[Buddy]

You should try, by all means, to get to this performance and take all of your important friends and relatives. You do not want to miss this Swan Lake. I repeat, you do not want to miss this.

Understood ! Will do my best.

Thank You !

[Buddy]

Buddy, I had the feeling you lived in the area, and that you would be very pleased with this news.

You should try, by all means, to get to this performance and take all of your important friends and relatives. You do not want to miss this Swan Lake. I repeat, you do not want to miss this.

Hi again Hagland,

Following your important instructions I have rescheduled travel plans and will be sitting in the second row March 18. I hope to tell you all about it.

Best Wishes, Buddy

[Azulynn]

Based on her performances in Paris, I have a hard time picturing her in Swan Lake. Can she really manage it technically at all ? She was so insecure in Symphonie Concertante and Bayadère that I wondered if she was still suffering from her injury. There was something constrained about her - you can tell she is Kirov-trained, but she doesn't seem to compare to her Russian colleagues right now (Lopatkina, Pavlenko, etc). Her expression (half-closed eyes, as if not entirely present to what she's doing) got annoying, since the dancing didn't quite match the diva look... So what makes her Odette/Odile so special ? I'm looking forward to Buddy's comments on her upcoming performance !

[carbro]

I am sorry she disappointed you, Azulynn.

To me, Part (while still not a principal ), is the most compelling of ABT's ballerinas. Her musicality and passion, on top of the exquisite Kirov training, are rare on today's ballet stage. Add to that her extraordinary beauty of face and form, and I just sit back and drink in the vision before me.

She lacks the brilliant technique and strength that ABT's other leading ladies display, and stamina is sometimes a problem, but what she gives is so rare that I find it very easy to forgive the fatigue at the end of the Black Swan pas. Her partnership with Gomes is pure magic.

I should also add that she is not the most consistent dancer. She can give very different readings of a role in consecutive performances. She takes artistic risks -- another fascination.

I eagerly await her performances at the Met this spring. :huepfen024:

[kfw]

Azulynn, you can find reviews of Part in Swan Lake here and here.

[drb]

Based on her performances in Paris, I have a hard time picturing her in Swan Lake. Can she really manage it technically at all ?.... So what makes her Odette/Odile so special ? I'm looking forward to Buddy's comments on her upcoming performance !

I have seen her four New York Swans. Each time her Odile has improved. But she really embodies (emdisembodies?) Odette. Each performance was radically different, alive. She isn't one to refine a role over time, rather she recreates it, as if she's a real creature reacting in the moment. Her back to Siegfried, the slightest brush of his leg with her wing. The house exploded with silence. Which became a roar when the variation ended. My favorite of all was her July 4, 2005 performance. Indeed, the finest O/O I've seen since Makarova in her prime. James Wolcott of Vanity Fair saw that performance and wrote the following:

I went to see her at the Met as Odette-Odile in Swan Lake, and felt resurrected. I haven't been this knocked sideways at the ballet since Baryshnikov exploded from the cannon. Not that Part indulged in pyrotechnics. She isn't Sylvie Guillem showing off her leggy Rockettes kicks. It's that she has the super-alive sharp focus of an artist incapable of betraying her artistry with false moves and conditioned responses. She savors every moment on stage as if it were newly minted.... No dancer alive uses her wrists and hands with more calligraphy than Part, their elegant air-tracings suddenly whipped into force when she swoops her arm away from a suitor in a tai chi semicircle--yin instantly tranformed into yang. In act two in an allegro passage, her swan arms beat as her toeshoes stabbed the floor with diagonal slashes.
.... as Odile, she was an imperial presence, her eyes in supreme command, and the fact that I even noticed her eyes was an astonishment--you almost never notice dancers' eyes, they're so doll-like and disciplined.
....When a performer of genius flames new life into an art form, particularly in an art as difficult and evanescent and often ossified as ballet, it has to be seen in person--taped recordings don't do justice...

http://www.vanityfai...ly_a_reaso.html

[bart]

Azulynn, you can find reviews of Part in Swan Lake here and here.

My Lord! Two performances, a little more than a year apart: and such different opinions about her dancing. Are we talking about the same dancer? This dancer's ability to elicit such extremes of response (pro and con) from knowledgeable reviewers remains a puzzle.

P.S.: I saw James Wolcott's love letter when it first appeared. Thanks for linking to it, drb. It's kind of sweet. You want it to be true, for Wilcott's sake.

[Haglund's]

I particularly remember that smoldering Swan Lake on the 4th of July. Who can forget all of the loud shouts of brava from male audience members from every corner of the house after the Act II pas. Part's appeal is in no small way her incredible sensuality. But her gift is to transport us to that place where we just willingly fall into the fantasy and the belief in this incredible creature. Gomes is a huge part of her success as Odette, and the current which passes between them will be very evident to Buddy and everyone else who sees them on March 18. Take a hankie.

[kfw]

P.S.: I saw James Wolcott's love letter when it first appeared. Thanks for linking to it, drb. It's kind of sweet. You want it to be true, for Wilcott's sake.

Yes, you do. That piece strikes so rich a chord, it cracks me up. Wolcott is married to Laura Jacobs, who writes about dance for The New Criterion, and who has published her own raptures about Ms. Part. From an essay entitled "Assoluta," much of which is about this ballerina, here's Jacobs on a Part-Gomes Swan Lake:

Part revealed the heart that’s been in lambswool these last two years. Here was an emotional Odette, passionately pitched, her narrative flights clear and momentous, and the delicacies, those trilling entrechat-passés en arrière, for instance, like water singing. When Odette first allows herself to lean back upon Siegfried’s chest, Part tendrils against him in something between rest and wrest. You never forget she’s trapped in feathers, in Rothbart’s spell. And when Odette approaches Siegfried with a full circling swoop of the arms that pulls her up to pointe, Part powers a whoosh so huge we see the danger of her love—she actually startled Gomes, overwhelmed him— the supernatural size of her, it is the conjuring of the spell blowing through her, white rush and strange heart, Wingwraith. This is imagination, wild and precise, rehearsed and released, big, bigger, biggest. This is Veronika Part, making bliss of the art once again.

[vipa]

P.S.: I saw James Wolcott's love letter when it first appeared. Thanks for linking to it, drb. It's kind of sweet. You want it to be true, for Wilcott's sake.

Yes, you do. That piece strikes so rich a chord, it cracks me up. Wolcott is married to Laura Jacobs, who writes about dance for The New Criterion, and who has published her own raptures about Ms. Part. From an essay entitled "Assoluta," much of which is about this ballerina, here's Jacobs on a Part-Gomes Swan Lake:

Part revealed the heart that’s been in lambswool these last two years. Here was an emotional Odette, passionately pitched, her narrative flights clear and momentous, and the delicacies, those trilling entrechat-passés en arrière, for instance, like water singing. When Odette first allows herself to lean back upon Siegfried’s chest, Part tendrils against him in something between rest and wrest. You never forget she’s trapped in feathers, in Rothbart’s spell. And when Odette approaches Siegfried with a full circling swoop of the arms that pulls her up to pointe, Part powers a whoosh so huge we see the danger of her love—she actually startled Gomes, overwhelmed him— the supernatural size of her, it is the conjuring of the spell blowing through her, white rush and strange heart, Wingwraith. This is imagination, wild and precise, rehearsed and released, big, bigger, biggest. This is Veronika Part, making bliss of the art once again.

This is really a bit much. I have seen Part in many roles and am still looking for the experience that others have had. In my experience she seems tense, flubs steps and under performs. Is it possible that those that love her are taken with her looks, body, Russian training and facial expressions? I just don't get it