For the last decade England has regularly lost to Norway at soccer (what we call football). However, last week we received some recompense with a Norwegian dance piece called, 'A Dance Tribute to the Art of Football' by the Jo Strømgren Kompani. <P>Sadly, this was one I missed, but all the critics were very positive - an unusual occurence. Here is a review from The Guardian with some background as well:<BR> <A HREF="http://www.newsunlimited.co.uk/arts/story/0,3604,103686,00.html" TARGET=_blank>www.newsunlimited.co.uk/arts/story/0,3604,103686,00.html</A> <P>Momix had a baseball piece - can anyone think of any other dance pieces based on sport?

Omigosh, soccer-inspired dance? I can see the American critics having a field day with this one (pun intended). I would have loved to have seen this. As many Americans are finding out, soccer can be a very graceful sport and I don't see why there can't be soccer-inspired moves in dance.<P>As for other sports, isn't Pucci working on a work called Sports, an homage to all sports? I vaguely remember reading about it in Dance Mag. I'll check on it once I return home this weekend.

There is also a story ballet choreographed by Twyla Tharp (when Baryshnikov was director) based on boxing, using popular music. It was an extremely entertaining and am sorry it is no longer performed. (Its title might The Champ.)

rr, are you referring to ABT? They actually did a boxing ballet? Wow.

Yes, The Champ was choreographed for ABT. The music was provided by a vocal group singing off to the side of the stage as well as the usual orchestra and involved a young girl who has a crush on the Champ and disguises herself as a boy in order to hang around his training camp, etc.