Dance: Soft Candy

When you go to a Stephen Petronio Company performance, you can count on a richly layered, juicily contemporary experience. His choreography is simultaneously slippery and taut: it’s sharply articulated, yet marked by a heady spontaneity. His terrific dancers come across as a mix of super-athletes and wild creatures. Plugged into both the art-rock music scene and the fashion world, Petronio collaborates with an imposing, often surprising array of musicians and with hip, young fashion designers—often to unexpected and revelatory effect. The works on his latest program are certainly the fruits of unusual and adventurous collaborations. For Beauty and the Brut, he’s working to a commissioned score by the local Electroclash duo Fischerspooner, with a vocal that may or may not be telling the story of a beach encounter between a French babe and an American guy, who Petronio delightedly characterizes as “gross.” The costumes are by Ben Cho. “He’s a young, wild designer: under 30, fabulous,” explains Petronio. “He’s also a DJ as well as an amazing designer.”

Also new in its completed form is This is the Story of a Girl in the World, whose four sections are set to music (there is an additional one in silence) by different composers, all feature the vocals of Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons. The work, which explores gender and iconic female constructs in dance and popular culture, includes one section set to a new version of The Velvet Underground’s “Candy Says,” Lou Reed’s homage to Warhol superstar Candy Darling, now performed by Reed and Antony. Petronio’s quartet for the song is costumed by young Australian designer Michael Angel. “His designs are a little bit more psychedelic, which I thought was appropriate for the Warhol period in which Lou Reed wrote that song.”

“Tony Cohen, who’s pretty fabulous, kind of new on the scene, did the costumes for two sections,” Petronio continues. “For the one with sophisticated music by Nico Muhly, which combines a viola with Antony’s voice, I wanted something very simple and elegant.”

Rounding out the program is a return engagement of Bloom, set to Rufus Wainright’s commissioned score that features the 44-member Young People’s Chorus of New York performing live. Petronio’s troupe has been touring the work—which examines transitions and transformations between realized and unrealized states—around the country, linking up with youth choirs in each city they perform in.

The music is obviously a rich component; but for Petronio, fashion design will never lose its power. “I look for people who allow the movement to really shine out, but I also look for a level of analysis and style that adds to the whole smell of the work. I’m looking for the sensibility of a fashion designer and how that translates into my dance,” explains Petronio. “My work is very intellectually and emotionally motivated, but I’m very much in love with the surface of things as well.”

April 1-6, Joyce Theater, 175 8th Ave. (at 19 St.), 212-242-0800; Tu. & Wed. 7:30; Thur.-Sat. 8, Sun. 2 & 7:30; $40 ($25 Sun. 7:30).