Louise Lecavalier @ Tramway

Although Nikki Millican has spent the last decade pushing the New Territories Festival beyond simple definitions, Louise Lecavalier is almost too easy to categorise. Fast, furious, athletic and acrobatic, Lecavalier is firmly within the contemporary dance tradition that found new erotic and celebratory potential in movement: while the emphasis on technique is not lost, the restraint of formalism gives way to an expressive, yet narrative driven, ecstasy.

Children has a clear plot: it traces a relationship from meeting, desire through sex, conflict to death. Lecavalier, now racing past her half decade, is a thunderstorm of energy and versatility. Bouncing around her male partner, exhausting him and holding the story with humour and explosive leaps and twirls, Lecavalier is a remarkable performer, whether in the pas de deux or spinning a metal pole like a skilled martial artist. Choreographer Nigel Charnock, one of the founders of British Physical Theatre through the company DV8, uses her physique to evoke the excitement, violence and sensuality of love.

The simple set and lighting, the small cast, the use of popular music and the direct narrative arc focus concentration on Lecavalier and her partner: only a dancer of supreme confident and finesse could hold that attention for an hour. The second dance, more like a brief encore, recalled Lecavalier's work with La La La Human Steps: equally volcanic, it is a sharp reminder of how straight up, old fashioned choreography can hit both the mind and body.