This [dance piece] is something we've been thinking about for a while. There seems to be some synergy between the three [songwriters]. We thought there was such a tight connection that to get all these things together in one production would be really fascinating.

People own the 'Moonlight' Sonata. Their children were conceived to it, and it's difficult to find anybody in Western society who doesn't have a personal relationship to that. You put [that widely known] a song on, and you start dancing to it, you are going to collide with people's own lives and own stories, and we are very interested in that.

We look at different facets, different relationships, the same relationship at different points in time. We look sometimes at the whole town and sometimes at individual relationships, and by the time we're done you have a sense of having met the people of this town.

The imagery is very much released from reality. It's not nailed down to specifics of the words. They're painting a picture, not telling linear stories.

When your mortality is threatened, it gets your priorities in order. I think, 'It's just modern dance.' I cannot get so worked up. It's important to me, I love doing it, but for God's sake, it's just modern dance.

This is the place where dance is going to come alive in San Diego. We'll have the synergy of the different companies working side by side and being sparked creatively by what the others are doing.