Founded in 1959, the NDT is today regarded as one of the best international dance and ballet companies to come out of Europe.

It actually has three ensembles - NDT I, NDT II and NDT III - each with its own character, repertoire and dancers. NDT III was set up in 1991 as a company for experienced dancers aged 40 or over.

The dancers are best known for giving the audience a total theatrical experience and, as its production notes say, 'applying the fruits of their vast experience to achieve standards of excellence combining modern and classical dance with mime, drama, comedy, bodily expression and, at times, song'.

Two of the three pieces selected for this Hong Kong Arts Festival programme - Birth-Day and When Time Takes Time - are created by the group's former artistic director and resident choreographer Jiri Kylian, while the third piece is the work of co-resident choreographer Hans van Manen.

Birth-Day sets comic dances to the uplifting music of Mozart. The birthday banquet celebrates the creativity, passion, love, high jinks and confusion that make our lives as colourful as the dance scenes.

Kylian says of his choice of music: 'Mozart is the greatest example of someone whose time between day 'A' and day 'Z' was painfully limited, but who nevertheless has understood life in all its richness, fantasy, clownery and madness.'

In When Time Takes Time, a small boy tries to play Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, which illustrates the constant universal desire for perfection. Van Manen's Two Faces features music by Georgian composer Giya Kancheli and is a tribute to love.

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