nanushka

Last night's (June 18) Swan Lake with Veronika Part and Cory Stearns was excellent. I don't know that I've seen Veronika dance this role with such solid technique, such deep emotion, or such delicate and voluptuous and elegant and perfectly controlled beauty. Her quivering legs; her long, fluid, gorgeous swan arms; her perfect mime; her devilishly sexy black swan smile; her awe-inspiring extensions -- she is an Odette for the ages, and an excellent (if not technically brilliant) Odile. I have long mourned the fact that Veronika is no longer paired with Marcelo Gomes in this ballet, but while she used to need him to rise to her best performances, she now seems more self-sufficient. At the same time, Cory has much improved. As with a number of other dancers in the company (Jared Matthews, for instance), there's been clear growth since last season. His dancing in Act I was crisp and fluid and more distinctly characterful than in the past. His partnering in the later acts was pretty much rock-solid. To be honest, though, I can't speak much to his connection with Veronika -- for when she was onstage, I was completely unable to take my eyes off of her. (At the same time, certain moments just made me want to close my eyes and savor the echo of the image -- I had to stop the impulse numerous times.) Cory's leap at the end of the ballet was gorgeous, and a nice complement to hers. He soared; she plummeted. Both were beautiful. The pas de trois was quite good. Sascha Radetsky substituted for Jared Matthews and I've rarely liked Sascha's dancing as much as I did last night. For one thing, he seemed to restrain his tendency to smirk. Like Cory's, his dancing was very clean and technically solid. Stella Abrera, taking the first variation, was also excellent. Her arms are so gorgeously fluid and artful. Melanie Hamrick seemed a bit messy, but not enough to detract from the overall effect of the piece. There was an amusing little moment in the danse des coupes (which in this production has no coupes) when the peasants all line up and one girl gets tossed down the line. At the final boy, she's supposed to get "dropped," but in fact this happened for real two boys too early (in the arms of whichever corps dancer looks exactly like Kenneth the page from 30 Rock). Of course, then they had to repeat it just a few beats later, which made nonsense of the already silly effect. If anyone in the company caught this on video, they should study the first fall, because it looked a lot more convincing than it usually does at the end of the line! The swan corps in Acts II and IV looked very clean, solid and beautiful. This usually doesn't happen until later in the week's run, so bravi to the company. The little swans were unusually well matched, and the only minor slip was at the very end, as they go down into their last position at the front of the stage. This always seems to be a problem spot for this particular corps. I usually tend to zone out a bit during the national dances (except the Neapolitan), but this time I made a conscious effort to watch more closely. I realized I can actually get some pleasure out of all but the last, the Polish mazurka, which is just simply dull and pointless. Patrick Ogle looked particularly good leading the Hungarian czardas; it was great to see Simone Messmer and Luciana Paris dancing together in the Spanish (I've long gotten the sense that they are kindred spirits); and Joseph Gorak and Luis Ribagorda looked great as usual in the Neapolitan. ("As usual" because they always individually look great, though I don't think I've ever seen them dance this piece together. An excellent pairing.) Ivan Vasiliev was purple Rothbart. Oy. This was a very poor casting decision. I can imagine it looked great on paper (and I was actually excited to see him), but it just does not work. Rothbart needs to be commanding and controlling and truly overwhelmingly sexually magnetic. I hate to say it, but it's really hard to pull that off when you're the shortest man in the room. Though I know it's (probably) not true, at times it looked like Veronika had a good 6 inches on him. She was his equal, not his subordinate; he was her younger brother, not her father. Not helping the matter was the fact that they kept the costume's thigh-high boots, which unfortunately accentuated Vasiliev's short, stocky legs. (The shoulder pads also looked terrible on such a short, dense figure.) And it wasn't just appearance--his dancing was not up to the part. His leaps, as usual, were high and clean, but he did not come close to covering the entire stage in the manner of (to name the very best) Marcelo Gomes in this role. His balance on one leg was very short, and there was an unusual (for him) amount of effort apparent in his manipulations of the princesses' bodies. I know it was his debut in the role, but I really don't think this is fixable; he should not be assigned it again. I just found him completely unconvincing, and it really broke the whole performance for me. Luckily, an excellent Black Swan pas de deux was immediately to follow -- perhaps the best I've ever seen Veronika dance this piece. There was so much palpable pleasure in her character's deception and seduction. Last year, dancing Swan Lake with Cory, Veronika seemed to push too hard to make up for the void of his character. This year, with his improvements and their continued experiences dancing together, the overall effect was far more satisfying. I'm looking forward to a very different experience tonight seeing Daniil Simkin and Isabella Boylston. If nothing else, it's sure to be fun!

This is exactly the problem. She writes: "In the Act III pas de deux, as Odette [sic], Ms. Semionova possessed more glittering allure, whipping off multiple double pirouettes in her fouetté turns. But it required effort to sense her body breathing inside of the music." What does that last sentence mean? What did you see?

Well heaven forbid ABT actually give that O/O to one of their own dancers. We've recently heard from Irina D. the effect all these guest artists are having on company morale and cohesiveness.

I thought Marian Butler had left ABT or even retired??

Last year it was after tickets went on sale.

The lifts were truly scary, though. With Hallberg's bad shoulder(s), I'm afraid that's a partnership that's just not meant to be. I'm hoping for Marcelo (esp. if Vishneva skips SL again) or, at least, Bolle (whose dancing I don't find to be all that great -- but at least he and V. look beautiful and glamorous together).

I believe a somewhat larger-than-average proportion of Veronika's height is in her legs, making her appear particularly tall onstage, and particularly in tutus. She also has long feet and perhaps slightly longer-than-average arms -- making her, in my opinion, the perfectly sized and proportioned ballerina. I so wish there were more like her. I could watch her Odette (with a good Siegfried) 7 nights a week. It's so hard having to wait a whole year for just one more performance! Okay, forgive me for gushing.

My question is not so much about Part herself and her dancing -- but rather about the partnering abilities of the ABT male corps/soloists. Perhaps I'm too pessimistic, though.

I may be wrong, but I believe the last two years casting has indeed been announced ahead of tickets going on sale (unlike the City Center "season," for which that is sadly not the case). I'm very disappointed in the number of performances and the early dates this year. I may well be in the minority here, but I much prefer seeing The Nutcracker later in December. Do we think they're likely to take it on the road after Dec. 16?

I don't recall every precise detail of Manon's choreography...but are there 7-10 men in the company who can gracefully and reliably perform challenging lifts of Veronika Part? The role of Manon in Lady of the Camellias is not at all the role of Manon in MacMillan's Manon. Don't get me wrong -- the role of MacMillan's Juliet has long been a fantasy part for me to see Veronika in. I just don't see Manon happening for her in this company.

And what a pleasure getting to see Veronika really shine in a comedic role!

...and so long as they aren't snatched up by guest artists.

Hopefully with Marcelo, as often as possible.

Cristian, When you return from Paris, if you have not seen the Zurich Ballet's Swan Lake with Semionova, you might want to check it out to get an idea of Semionova. Although it is choreographed by Heinz Spoerli (after Petipa), Semionova's Odette/Odile is basically traditional. Everything else is not, but it is worth watching for her. She is a lovely Odette/Odile with some nice balances and I think she characterizes the two roles well. This video has very sparse sets, modern dress, and lots of new choreography (for most characters other than Odette/Odile). It also has a storyline between Rothbart and Siegfried that I don't quite understand (not sure what is going on). With all that said even the new choreography is classical ballet style and overall it is more traditional than the Amazon reviews would lead you to believe. I think it is worth getting just to see Semionova's swan. I wonder if anyone on here has seen this video and her recent Swan Lake with ABT. If so, please comment on whether she has improved, etc. I think the video, despite some non-traditional things, is a must have for Semionova fans. It gives you a great idea of her dancing. Birdsall The complete video is also available on YouTube.

Raymonda with Veronika Part!

Thank you for the beautiful photo, Waelsung. To my eyes, Semionova peaked in Act II, whereas Hallberg only got better and better. As Waelsung commented, his dancing was more emotional, less cool, than it sometimes is, especially in his Act III variation. Throughout the evening, the contrast with Cory earlier in the week, both technically and dramatically, was striking. David can turn with complete fluidity -- no hopping at the end -- and stop exactly where he needs. I heard one single squeak from his shoes in the 'moody' section in Act I, in contrast with a dozen from Cory. I kept wishing that Veronika could once again be paired with someone more like this (preferably Marcelo, as David has trouble lifting her), so she would no longer have to carry the entire emotional weight of the show, as she did on Monday. (As a sidenote on David: he seems to have slimmed down in the last year. In general he looks very good, though just one unfortunate side-effect of this, which I'll leave you to infer.) I thought that Semionova's Act II dancing was beautiful, and technically superb -- probably the most 'flawless' Act II I've seen at ABT. I was very excited going into the second half, and apparently so was the audience. Nearly every time she came on stage from that point on, there was substantial applause: with Rothbart in Act III, with David at the beginning of the pdd, on the rocks in Act IV. People were ready to be wowed by her, and to a certain extent it didn't much matter what happened from there. In her big balance during the pdd's first movement, for instance, the applause began very early -- before the balance was even of notable length. To her great credit, it did go on for quite some time more. (I find applause during a balance to be unfortunate, and potentially counter-productive.) For her fouettes, she began with a long series of doubles, shifting to singles when the music changes, punctuated by an occasional double; she wobbled about 15-20 degrees several times and traveled about 8-10 feet. I love multiple fouettes, but I would much rather have a solid series of 32 singles, on the beat, and with minimal traveling, than something showier but more technically insecure. Again, though, the audience went wild, so much so that I fear many were distracted from the fast, perfect spins that David gave them next. Still, there was much great dancing from Semionova during Act III, as others have described -- just much better dancing from Hallberg. His reached an emotional peak at the end of Act III and into Act IV, whereas I found her dancing in Act IV to seem rather calculated. As a very small but representative example: At the beginning of the reconciliation scene, Odette goes downstage left and turns away from Siegfried, with her arms spread. Siegfried comes behind her and, tentatively, takes her right (downstage) hand. Semionova, knowing that Hallberg would be taking her hand, deliberately lowered it and (though turned away) almost held it back to him. At this all-important moment, when Odette should be absorbed in broken-hearted renunciation, she instead seemed almost coy, waiting for Siegfried to try to make it up to her. This is a very small detail, but it captures much of what I saw in Act IV from her. Whereas David was absorbed in the emotion of his dancing, she seemed to know and be thinking about where she was going to put every part of her body at every moment. Obviously, this is just an impressionistic response, and difficult to substantiate fully, but it was indeed the impression that I got. Hammoudi danced a better Rothbart than I've seen from him in the past, though with numerous mistakes (including a botched lift of Sarah Smith, which I'm fairly certain was in fact her fault -- she danced a rather messy Hungarian Princess). Given how much praise was being lavished on Semionova, I felt the audience could have spared him at least a bow, but alas no. Luciana Paris jumped the gun and dove into the final pose of the cygnettes a beat early for some reason. Melanie Hamrick danced a very nice big swan, with Simone Messmer along for the ride. Maria Riccetto danced the third variation in the pas de trois -- which has long been my favorite piece for her -- but the conductor took it very fast, and so it was not nearly as perfectly lovely as it often is. The white swan pdd, on the other hand, was played gorgeously, deliciously slow, as we all savored every moment of Semionova and Hallberg's nearly perfect Act II. Karen Uphoff and David Hallberg had some very nice banter going on with each successive princess during the national dances -- gave me something to divert my eyes from the generally very sloppy performances in this part of the evening. (Craig Salstein and Joseph Phillips were woefully mismatched, to the latter's detriment, in the Neapolitan dance. Phillips just couldn't keep up, though he did much better on Monday.) On to Corsaire!

Last year I'm fairly certain it was quite awhile after, unfortunately.

Thank you, Drew, for the beautiful descriptions of the Ratmansky Firebird above, which convey so well what I saw as well. I was ready for a disappointing experience, based on many of the reviews here and elsewhere. But despite some flaws, I found it to be a really wonderful complete work, very imaginative and funny and -- yes -- musical, even if perhaps not so perfectly in tune with the music as Ashton was with Mendelssohn's.

See the topic 'Casting Updates Spring 2012 Met Season,' where a casting list including Rothbart is posted.

This is, interestingly, not the case in opera (to the extent that singers are severely criticized if they break character for even a moment). For both opera (where end-of-act bows are quite typical) and ballet (with bows after every movement of most classical pdds) the traditional 'fourth wall' is not at all an impermeable boundary.

The general tour of the Metropolitan Opera House -- which is a great experience -- includes visits to the principal dressing rooms and the costume workshop, among many other stops.

Yes, he was. Very sorry that we won't be seeing him in the role. Still, he works quite hard enough as it is!

It would probably not make it easier, though, if indeed they changed their dates to come after the NYCB season. The later in the summer it gets, the harder it is to fill the seats, I'd guess.

So glad to hear this! It always feels so awkward having to wait before clapping in this ballet -- especially for a dancer one is so thrilled to be seeing again.

Cornejo did them on Friday, competently though not spectacularly.