DANCE REVIEW : A BLEND OF LOUIS AND BRUBECK

From the late ‘40s, both modern dance choreographer/performer Murray Louis and modern jazz composer/performer Dave Brubeck have embodied a new style of virtuosity--one that looks to Europe in its emphasis on technical intricacy but remains all-American in its surging energy and eclectic vernacular influences.

The Louis-Brubeck collaboration, Friday in Royce Hall, UCLA, neither extended nor even summarized their expressive range, but it did highlight the democratic (rather than hierarchical) ensemble values that have made each of these artists a paradigm of Yankee individuality and creative interaction.

Set to canned Brubeck, Louis’ 10-year-old octet “Glances” developed an invigorating percussive attack that splendidly harnessed the drive of the jauntier music. Just as Brubeck occasionally will include fragments of pop tunes in a passage of otherwise abstract pianistic filigree, Louis dropped hints of flapper mannerisms, balletic aerialism and show-dance pizazz within his playful group sequences.

However, “Glances” grew arbitrary and unpersuasive when Brubeck became slow and moody, as if Louis could provide only a stolid, unfocused overlay to a musical experience possessing far greater imaginative resources.

Unifying all the sections: scarlet unitards and a design gambit in which a final dance pose--an angular lift, for example--would suddenly turn up, enlarged and abstracted, as a slide projection on the backdrop.

With the Dave Brubeck Quartet playing upstage, Louis’ “Four Brubeck Pieces” (1984) reveled in the special freedom and excitement that dancers can’t feel or convey when shackled to a recording.

Dressed in form-fitting, black-and-white striped playwear, the eight cast members lined up, linked arms, shook hands, clustered and paired off in complex patterns exploring soloist-ensemble relationships.

Finally, to Paul Desmond’s “Take Five,” they cut loose. Bold turning leaps by Christopher Strauss, daring martial arts kick-jumps by Rob McWilliams, high-velocity running/rolling by Cynthia Marie Sigler, improbable frog hops and turns in deep plie by Edward Akio Taketa and a sprawling, flying display of contempt for normal conditions of balance by just about everyone.

Without Brubeck, “Frail Demons” (to a taped score by Alwin Nikolais) found Louis looking impressively fit at 59 in a sleeveless tan jump suit, and making a personal showpiece from quick-change movement characterization (including robot-rigidity and apelike ambling), contrasts in scale (suspensions of a leg set against shimmering fingers) and meticulous control of muscular isolations.

Without Louis, the Brubeck Quartet introduced its members in “The Duke” and then set about showcasing them with “Tritonis” (Bobby Militello venturing the most difficult tests of ascending/descending, rapid-fire pipery), “Big, Bad Basie” (the liquid cascades of Brubeck’s piano suddenly heard without any backup and, later, his son, Chris, blaring away on bass trombone) and “Out of the Way” (a furious assault by drummer Randy Jones).