With a program full of twisting, turning and tumbling choreography, Pilobolus Dance Theater (named after a barnyard fungus!) is making just one Houston concert appearance this year. The troupeย’s work has been called ย“liquefied acrobatics.ย” Pilobolus charms audiences with its limber ย“odd beautyย” and ย“lyric poetry,ย” as The New York Times said last summer.

The groupย’s been around since 1971, when members got together in a Dartmouth College dance class. Since then, Pilobolus has traveled the world with its humorous, whimsical and often narrative programs. Todayย’s show features Ocellus, a 1972 masterwork that The Washington Post described as ย“an animated human clump bulging with still more entwined bodies, the whole mass moving like silk.ย” And though the troupe has sometimes been faulted for being too athletic, audiences love it ย— who wouldnย’t enjoy an evening watching all those gorgeous, and often almost naked, bodies moving in some very surprising ways? See Pilobolus in the flesh today at 8 p.m. Jones Hall, 615 Louisiana. For information, call 713-227-4772 or visit www.spahouston.org. $20 to $60.


Fri., Feb. 13, 8 p.m., 2009

This article appears in Feb 12-18, 2009.