Richard Lutz continues his coverage of the International Dance Festival Birmingham.

Dancers tumble, roll, float, run and crawl across the wide Hippodrome stage to a continual techno building roll of music punctuated at times (I think) with strains of a Dean Martin warble.

The movement by the Swiss troupe Alias never stops and the dancers in Sideways Rain must have supernatural strength and agility to keep up this mesmeric work. It lasts only 60 minutes but another hour could have rolled by as the performers appear to be moved by currents of a prehistoric oceans or wall to wall wind like leaves in the autumn.

Brazilian choreographer  Guilherme Botelho uses his  troupe as a metaphor – this is no simple narrative story and it seems to mark our beginnings (the crawling and tumbling), our growing movement upward (with the walking and running) and our connections with each other  ( the first human contact coming late in the work).

I wondered at first why this piece was given the large Christmas-cake of a venue like the Hippodrome and when I saw how the 14 used the big stage, I understood. It is a big piece with a surprise change of style at the end and a fluid spectacle that should be seen if you are at all interested in dance, the human body and how  music connects the two. It is being staged again on Wednesday 30th April.

More on the month long dance festival on: idfb.co.uk

Tickets: 0844 338 5000