DANCE REVIEW : Premieres on Loretta Livingston Program at Japan America

When Loretta Livingston dances, the tiniest rotation of her wrist has the sharp, clear impact of a thunderclap. In her extraordinary new solo, “Don’t Fall, Pomegranate”--part of her company’s Saturday night program at Japan America Theatre--small, sustained, desperate movements and a hypnotically repetitive score by Carl Stone created the feeling of witnessing moments from the end of the world.

Poised on her haunches, feeling the ground with her forearm, Livingston seemed not to trust the evidence of her senses. Lying on the floor, testing the workings of her foot, she appeared enclosed in a dense and airless atmosphere. When she tilted her head back and opened her mouth--for rain?--the birdlike gesture evoked an awful, doom-filled weight.

Toward the end of a series of blackout scenes, she balanced on one hip and turned in her feet so that they suddenly looked deformed. She washed herself from a source only she could see. Finally, stripped down to a G-string, she moved away in a frenzy of big steps. The intensity and focus of this 20-minute piece were reminiscent of butoh , the stark Japanese dance form.

“Before the Burning,” Livingston’s other premiere, was more of a puzzle.

The costuming for the two couples (the men in berets and capes, the women in Juliet gowns with floral wreaths in their hair) and even the way dancers entered by crisscrossing the stage suggested the subject might be a court intrigue or a lovers’ mix-up, a la “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” But the piece seemed to be more about the breakdown of class distinctions in dance--or what would happen if ballet courtiers got rhythm.

Promenading to and fro to the accompaniment of Prokofiev’s Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2, and often gesturing with one raised arm as if about to execute a sweeping bow, these fine folk conformed blandly to the outward form of ceremony. In the second movement, they wheeled themselves about in a faster, more accented way, sometimes accusing one another with a pointing finger. The hidden drama in this gesture was never revealed.

Small, erratic movements of the head, cantilevered turns reminiscent of the style of modern dance pioneer Doris Humphrey and quick half-toe walks animated the third movement. In the finale, the dancers practically turned into peasants, stamping their feet and linking arms in a circle. If much of the choreography seemed needlessly repetitive, the piece has a wonderful audacity.

Also on the program were “Paper/Scissors/Rock,” Livingston’s duet for herself and her husband, David Plettner, and last year’s “From Apogee to Perigee.”

Certain kinetic motifs crop up perhaps too often in Livingston’s work, like moving in profile and stepping with knees raised high. But she has evolved a personal, experimental style, and her small group of dancers has quick, economical movers who allow the steps to seem transparent, unshaded either by strong personality or apparent effort.