Laudatory quotes flow around Hubbard Street Dance like fog down the Richmond - and deservedly so. One of the first dance companies I ever saw perform, Hubbard Street set me up as a dance lover for life - it's the type of performance you recommend to friends and then invite yourself along. And they’re moving more brilliantly than ever. The seventeen-dancer ensemble hits Berkeley this weekend, where they’ll perform West Coast premieres of Nacho Duato’s Arcangelo, Alejandro Cerrudo’s Deep Down Dos and Blanco, and 27’52” by the incomparable Jiri Kylian.

 
Fluid and precise, these expert dancers make the most complex steps seem effortless. In Arcangelo, the dancers are twisted into knots with ephemeral riffs on death as the ultimate freedom. Deep Down Dos is intimately connected to the music - running, spiralling, and falling, the dancers are a magnetic flux of motion. Blanco is a mix of avante garde and sculpted movement for a quartet of women and unlike any other work in the companies repertoire. As for the Kylian piece, a youtube video speaks a thousand words: