Your daughter has the potential to be a good ballet dancer. Your son has great facility. Your dancer has the perfect ballet body. In every interview we’ve done, whether it’s with ballet teachers, competition judges or whomever, those words get thrown around. And NO ONE ever tells us what they refer to. Plus, we have gotten loads of questions asking us how to define these terms. Since we really didn’t know, we decided to ask someone who did!
Ballet Help Desk recently sat down with Francis (Fran) Veyette, a former principal dancer with the Pennsylvania (now Philadelphia) Ballet and the Co-Founder of the Veyette Virtual Ballet School. Note – both of our kids took virtual classes with VVBS during Covid and we cannot say enough good things about them!
We’ll be publishing the full interview on Wednesday, October 25th, but here are some of the highlights. Words like potential, facility, body type and others are really loaded, so we decided to dig in and talk about what they really mean!
Potential
I have heard this word used so many times that I swear it even invades my REM sleep. My son was eleven when he auditioned for a large, company affiliated ballet school. When he came out of the audition, I asked him about it and he was none too thrilled with his experience. I asked him what they had him do, he said, “It was dumb. All we did was skip, gallop and jump as high as we could. They didn’t even make us dance!”
I relayed this conversation to Fran and he gave us a nodding laugh. But, he also told us that this is the perfect way to gauge potential in young dancers. Seriously? He pointed out that skipping, galloping and jumping all require a lot of coordination. And, all of these activities are indicators of a child’s natural strength as well as their balance. He described the characteristics a teacher looks for in determining potential as this: strength, flexibility, coordinated turnability (ballet-speak for “do you lose your balance when turning”) and whether or not they can jump.
So, back to my son’s audition. Skipping, galloping and jumping pretty much covers all aspects of “potential” in a young kid. When you hear the word “potential,” it means your dancer has those physical characteristics that, coupled with hard work, gives them the basis for developing into a strong ballet dancer.
Facility
This word meant nothing to me the first time I heard it and I’m sure most non-dance parents would agree that facility usually means a place, not a set of traits ascribed to a child! But, we’re in the alternative universe that is ballet. So, Fran, what does facility mean?
Facility, according to him, it’s closely related to potential. However, it refers more to physical characteristics of one’s body. For example, how well can a student point their feet? And, are those feet “archy?” But, not too archy! Are a dancer’s hips naturally open? Is the dancer flexible by nature? Yes, flexibility can be improved, but natural flexibility is important as well because one can only stretch ligaments so far. As someone who has never been able to touch her toes, I can attest that stretching only gets you to a certain point.
Finally, does the dancer have natural hyperextension in their legs? For those of us who did not grow up as dancers, I realized that hyperextension and hypermobility are fancy terms for knock-kneed. Although they are technically slightly different, I’d be hard pressed to be able to distinguish the two when lined up next to each other!
According to Fran, potential plus facility gets your dancer on the road to maybe being able to go after a professional career at some point.
Body Type
Oh, how I hate this term. But, ballet is subjective so let’s talk about it. Body type is NOT a euphemism for skinny. Sure, there are loads of skinny dancers. But, there are also lots of dancers who are built more like gymnasts. Fran’s wife, Lauren Fadeley-Veyette is one and she ended up in the corps of New York City Ballet at 16 and retired from Miami City Ballet as a principal dancer in her late thirties! Lauren, albeit an extraordinary dancer, was quite muscular. And, she did not fit that oddball Balanchine aesthetic from long ago of long arms, long legs, long neck, small head and super skinny.
According to Fran, “There is a wide variety in terms of what is an “acceptable” body type, but it’s subjective.” He said that it’s better to be more flexible, have arched feet, be a good turner, good jumper, strong, flexible and coordinated. But, he also was quick to point out that body shape is debatable. Note, he never used the words long and skinny.
However, Fran did note that in order to perform at the highest level, it is not always about how skinny a dancer is. Rather, he discusses how one needs to be at their operational best. This means fueling your body with the right exercises as well as the best nutrients that allow you to perform at the highest level you can. He also briefly touches on the myriad unhealthy habits that have long existed in the ballet world and he also pointed out how underrated nutrition is.
“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
Fran was also quick to emphasize that you can have all the talent in the world, but nothing beats hard work. He talked about how hard work can compensate for less than perfect potential. He also noted that he has worked with a lot of insanely talented dancers who didn’t work as hard as they could have or that they had a lousy attitude. He was even honest enough to admit that he was one of those dancers that didn’t always have the best attitude and that he lost a job in part because it.
But, Fran lit up when he talked about those who were blessed with the talent and the work ethic. Or, perhaps he lit up because he was describing his wife, Lauren, who possesses that incredible combination of potential and the willingness to work extremely hard. Either way, he was clear that those who make it in the ballet world are those who capitalize on the natural ability that some dancers are fortunate enough to be born with and combine it with an insanely strong work ethic.
To hear more of our conversation with Fran, be sure to tune in to our podcast on October 25th. Just search Ballet Help Desk wherever you get your podcasts or listen on our website.