Retrospectives seem to licence any kind of programming, from the capricious to the intense. Which is why Bill T Jones - currently celebrating his own company's 20th anniversary - has no qualms about taking us on a packed, 90-minute tour of his repertory with barely a pause, and absolutely no interval.
The Gift is Arnie Zane's austerely passionate, perfectly judged opener but it segues straight into the disconcertingly scrappy solo Etude (a mess, despite Jones himself, who boasts the most eloquent arms in the business, broad as an eagle's wings, nuanced as an Indian temple dancer). Two video extracts follow, then, still reeling, we are shunted into the main event of the evening, Reading, Mercy and the Artificial Nigger.
This 45-minute dance runs alongside a reading of Flannery O'Connor's short story, The Artificial Nigger. It is a typically supercharged piece of O'Connor prose about a cranky, implacable racist who takes his six-year-old grandson Nelson up to the city to teach him about its immoral ways. Violence and magic lend the narrative an oppressive fascination but Jones' triumph as a choreographer is to find light, colour and space in the story.
Dancers take turns to portray old Mr Head and Nelson, while the rest of the cast image the crowds and the characters they encounter. Sometimes the choreography vividly mimics the story. Little Nelson gazing longingly at the hot, ample beauty of a black woman is imaged by a dancer hoisted like a deity on the shoulders of the group. Sometimes Jones restricts himself to semi-abstract evocation of rhythm and atmosphere, letting the words drip-feed their own precise meanings on to the stage.
In its formal sophistication and range of devices, Artificial Nigger ranks as one of Jones's finest works. But we need to see it in a far more spacious frame than this Wells programme provides. Not only has it been given an overcrowded preface, but its closing tableau runs almost directly into Mercy 10 x 8 on a Circle. Since this work recycles much of the choreographic material from Nigger, set to music by Beethoven, the juxtaposition ought to provide a provocative lesson in form and narrative. In fact, it feels like overload.
· Until Saturday. Box office: 0870 737 7737. Then touring.
