Helios Dance Theater Leans and Builds on Genius of Bach

When you start with ballet and Bach, you have to take advantage of his momentum and make people glad you wove your dancers into it--or you’re set to fail by leaning on his genius without adding to it. When Laura Gorenstein, the force behind Helios Dance Theater, chose Bach’s “Concerto in D Minor for Two Violins” for her piece, “Scratch Swallow Self,” she might have also been aware of the shadow of Balanchine’s brilliant “Concerto Barocco,” which uses the same contagiously vibrant music.

Luckily, Helios added to rather than diminished the taped Bach on Friday night at the Los Angeles Theatre Center. Echoes of Balanchine surfaced in the piece’s stripped-down classical lines, with flippant edges and “showgirl” poses. But Gorenstein’s twist on the balletic showgirl includes questioning her primacy with interruptions of everyday gesture--the insecure shielding of body parts, competitive pushing and hiccups of emotion that escape the otherwise smoothly flowing counterpoint.

So there is a hint of trouble in paradise, but in the end, grace seems to merge with protest. Wind-swept and well-crafted, “Scratch Swallow Self,” is visually striking, with beautiful curves that break into everyday dithering just briefly before they merge into finely balanced groupings. Standing out in the strong five-member ensemble were Diana Mehoudar and Kate Weare.

Also on the short program were three mostly inchoate solos by Gorenstein, the most interesting of them “Mother Run,” in which Weare is like a demented Isadora.

In a gauzy white dress with nothing underneath, she meanders romantically, skips with too much force and seems not to know what she’s exposing. Like “Strike” and “Dos and Don’ts,” the solo was well-performed and limply enigmatic.