Partners in Sublime

For the most dynamic performers, artistry is an embodied quality. Whether through natural aptitude or diligent training—or most often, a combination of the two—the performer transcends the physical, choreographed act of their composition to present something that lingers outside the boundaries of their form. This is what distinguishes a performance from a play-by-play. It is an ethos that Skylar Brandt, the American Ballet Theatre principal, and the pianist Vladimir Rumyantsev, expressed in their joint concert, “That’s How We Met.”

Performance

“That’s How We Met” by Skylar Brandt and Vladimir Rumyantsev

Place

Merkin Hall, Kaufman Music Center, New York, NY, June 2, 2025

Words

Rebecca Deczynski

Pianist Vladimir Rumyantsev and Skylar Brandt in “That’s How We Met.” Photograph by Taylor Brandt

Staged for one night only on June 2 at the Kaufman Music Center’s Merkin Hall—which was outfitted day-of with a Marley floor for the occasion—the program is Brandt and Rumyantsev’s debut of their creative partnership. The two are also romantic partners, having first met when the pianist spent a year playing for ABT. As the story goes, Rumyantsev was in an empty studio, rehearsing Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 when Brandt, recognizing the piece, poked her head inside to listen. Six years later, Brandt invited the pianist, who had long left ABT for the concert circuit, to a performance of “Scheherazade.” The rest is history.

This evening’s performance was an encapsulation of their shared passion for classical music and its influence on dance—and vice versa. While Brandt joined Rumyantsev onstage for just two out of nine pieces, the program is suffused with heavy hitters of ballet: Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Saint-Saëns, and, of course, Tchaikovsky.

It officially began, however, with a less familiar name: Barbara Brandt.

Pianist Vladimir Rumyantsev and Skylar Brandt in “That’s How We Met.” Photograph by Taylor Brandt

The first composer on the program is, in fact, the ballerina’s mother—an accomplished pianist in her own right who Brandt credits with her extensive knowledge of and love for music. It is to her composition, No. 1, which she wrote at 16 years of age, that Brandt has developed her choreographic debut. It is titled, tenderly, “For Mom.”

The piece begins with Brandt, dressed in a girlish white dress, ankle socks, and ballet slippers, sitting cross-legged near the end of the glossy black Steinway that centers the stage. The melody that Rumyantsev begins to play is mellifluous, and Brandt rises into an airy petit allegro. Sequences of sissons are delicate yet grounded, especially when finished in an expansive sisson ouverte, Brandt breathing through a luxurious allongé. Her long hair, worn down, adds to her lighthearted and lissome effect. She is not a sylph or any kind of balletic spectre, but rather, a young woman revealing in her own language, the contents of her heart.

“For Mom” is a choreographed reverie—one that, like any daydream—has its moments of lingering reflection. Several times in the piece, Brandt rests her cheek on both hands, laid flat together, her eyes closed in apparent bliss. It is a moment almost too lovely, her expression seems to convey, as the music channels through her body, from her core and outward through her controlled port de bras.

At other moments, she takes a pause, lingering at the piano—Lucy and Schroeder-style—to watch Rumyantsev play before she is set compulsively back into motion. It is a piece with moments of ecstasy, as in Brandt’s animated jumps, and contemplation, as the dancer surrenders more calculated movements to instances of pause and listening. It ends in a simple moment of connection: Brandt joins Rumyantsev on his piano bench, where she leans her head against his shoulder. Once he’s hit the final chord, he turns to match her adoring gaze.

Pianist Vladimir Rumyantsev and Skylar Brandt in “That’s How We Met.” Photograph by Taylor Brandt

It’s a lovely start to the concert, which makes a strong showing of Rumyantsev’s prowess as a pianist. Most beloved of the balletomanes in the audience was the musician’s performance of the Rose Adagio from Tchaikovsky’s “Sleeping Beauty,” dedicated to ABT principal répétiteur Irina Aleksandrovna Kolpakova. It is hard not to imagine Brandt performing the difficult and arresting piece—part of which she memorably performed alone, at home during 2020’s lockdowns—especially because of the pianist’s sublime ability to carry the song through the concert hall as if he were accompanied by a full orchestra. But it is also in Brandt’s absence from this piece that the real theme of the evening comes into view. This is music in search of a dancer, and in their partnership, Rumyantsev and Brandt have found their ideal complement.

When Brandt returns to the stage, near the end of the program, to dance “The Dying Swan”—the iconic Michel Fokine solo first created on Anna Pavlova—she, too, gets an opportunity to demonstrate the breadth of her artistry. Brandt’s swan is not a sad one, though her performance is one that evokes the emotion in onlookers. Instead, she appears defiant, almost in denial of her imminent demise. She first crosses the stage quickly in rapid bourrés, and her wingspan, which flutters softly at a baseline, occasionally folds in on itself as death grows nearer. Brandt holds her chin aloft, her eyes following these uncooperative limbs in apparent disbelief or denial. When she faces her back to the audience, arms above her head and trembling and the piano moves into a higher register, her swan softens in acceptance as she folds to the floor. But she doesn’t finish in resigned repose, shifting, at the final moment into a final posture, one leg swept behind her and her arms outstretched, her body tilted on an axis.

Rebecca Deczynski

Rebecca Deczynski is a New York City-based writer and editor publishes the newsletter Thinking About Getting Into. Her work has appeared in publications including Inc., Domino, NYLON, and InStyle. She graduated from Barnard College cum laude with a degree in English and a minor in dance.

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