Trois Grandes Fugues, Lyon Opera Ballet, Sadler’s Wells, Islington, London

Trois Grandes Fugues is a simple but clever idea. Three different choreographers take the same piece of music, in this case Beethoven’s “Die Grosse Fuge”, and bring their interpretation of it, to the stage. I came to the show not knowing the music and uninformed with regard to the language of dance.

The three dances are all completely different. The first is the most traditionally classical in its form. Lucinda Childs has six couples investigate the geometric patterns in the music. The dancers are dressed in simple grey figure hugging body suits, the dance is graceful, formal, mathematical and balletic.

The next, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, has her 8 dancers, 6 men and 2 women, in dark suits with open necked white shirts. Formally dressed at first the jackets are removed and some of the shirts are opened as the dance moves on. Each dancer appears to be linked to different sections of the orchestra and they move across the stage, together or apart, each seemingly linked to their own particular instrument.

The final piece by Maguy Marin, has her dancers less formally dressed, in shades of red, and her interpretation is wilder, more emotional, and the four dancers emphasise the dramatic and canonical motifs. They follow each other round the stage in more staccato movements, showing the fierce energy and strife in Beethoven’s work.

I like Beethoven, usually his pastoral pieces are more to my taste, having heard this 20 minute work three times, each time I enjoyed it more, and I will look out for it, to listen to at home. I had a fantastic evening and I felt like I had been given an introductory lesson into both classical music and dance.