The shift key – challenged Ate9 dANCE cOMPANY and its director, Danielle Agami, are known devotees of Gaga. Not Lady Gaga, although her imaginative gyrations certainly qualify as dance, but the innovative movement aethestic of Ohad Naharin, who leads Israel's Batsheva Dance Company, where Agami once danced. Aimed at developing a dancer's full range of physical ability, the results, at least as personified by Ate9's eight dancers, are slow movements as detailed and liquid as a Tai Chi master, which can still explode, à la Jackie Chan, with powerful propulsive jumps and falls. Over the last year, the troupe's calling card, Sally Meets Stu, drew attention with excerpts at several local dance festivals and the full work in smaller venues. Agami raised her own profile over the year working with Benjamin Millepied's L.A. Dance Project and creating a floor-bound solo for Melissa Barak of Barak Ballet. Not bad for a choreographer and troupe that relocated here from Seattle just a little more than a year ago. Ate9's rising prospects include a move to a larger venue for the premiere of Agami's newest, mouth to mouth. With performances this weekend and next, mouth to mouth has an original score by L.A.-based composer Jodie Landau, performed live by modern music ensemble wild UP. What is it with these folks and that shift key? Los Angeles Theatre Center, 514 S. Spring St., dwntwn.; Sat., April 26 & May 3, 8:30 p.m.; $30 general, $50 VIP, $25 students, seniors & veterans. (866) 811-411, thelatc.org/additional-events/.

Saturdays, 8:30 p.m. Starts: April 26. Continues through May 3, 2014
(Expired: 05/03/14)

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