CONFESSIONS ON A DANCEFLOOR: (L-R) Roni Koresh, Myra Bazell and Brian Sanders jitterbug, hustle and pop 'n' lock through time. : Michael T. Regan

And while the program is a collaboration, they're not working collectively. Rather, each is responsible for different segments of the show, a concept piece built around popular dance and music of the last 50 years.

The three came together at the invitation of Randy Swartz, artistic director of the Dance Celebration series. Swartz wasn't just thinking of their strong fan bases; he also feels that "each of them has harbored a feel for the popular vernacular that they have not necessarily exposed in the context of their artistic vision. We've only seen snippets of it."

Certainly each choreographer has a distinctive style: Bazell goes for postmodern hyperkinetic, sweeping movement; Koresh's company delivers dramatic, technically exquisite contemporary dance; while Sanders creates entertaining and frequently edgy fantasyscapes. Swartz, however, asked these artists to divert from familiar MOs for The Music That Made Us Dance. As he explains, "I gave them [the liberty] to move beyond what they would normally do … without getting away from their image."

The parameters of The Music That Made Us Dance required that each choreographer create a work to encapsulate a two-decade time period. Planning meetings bore out that each of them had a personal passion for a particular era or style of music. Bazell was a fan of funk and soul; Sanders wanted to delve into disco; and Koresh had an affinity for techno and hip-hop, elements of which can be seen in his regular repertoire.

Koresh also signed on for the show's opening segment, encompassing the 1940s and 1950s. This past month, Koresh's corps has been getting a good workout, doing the lindy and jitterbug to the tune of swing music. Turns out, way back when, Koresh studied these styles of movement, and swing is indeed the music that made him dance: "It's what I grew up on," he says. "Watching the movies of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. It's programmed in my head and in my body to a certain degree." Koresh's dancers were surprised by his ability to re-create dances of those days gone by, but he thoroughly enjoyed the process. "It was like being a kid again for a while."

Bazell took on the task of representing the 1960s and 1970s. As a young teen in the '70s, she was "full-out in the clubs," and so has a reference point for that decade but capturing the essence of the '60s required research. "I saturated myself with the lyrics and rhythms of funk and soul," she says. Bazell also dug into speeches by socio-political figures of the era, especially Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, whose words are heard throughout her piece. "On top of all this celebratory music by James Brown, Gladys Knight and Chaka Khan, there's this other reality going on," she comments.

To capture his era, Sanders researched the disco scene. He notes, "I did not innately know the hustle. I was a little young at the time." Sanders was able to draw on personal recollection to capture the character of new wave, another popular dance and music mode of his designated time period. However, he's not re-creating new wave dance moves. "It's a reflection," he explains. "I felt like musically everything was very cleanly produced but still having a voice against the system. … My artistic interpretation is of a new generation trying to define itself, and an older generation looking at it and wanting it to be like itself."

All three choreographers are integrating elements of popular steps from their respective time periods. Yet the show is not about creating a series of social dances. Koresh observes, "Some of the dance is authentic to the time. There are glimpses of the era, and then it goes into my personal language."

Sounds like a winning combination. Still, a dance fan can hope for more: Is there any possibility these three will join together in collective collaboration, for even a small portion of this production?

"It's a romantic idea," admits Bazell. "But we all have so much going on."

The Music That Made Us Dance: From Lindy to Hip-Hop, Thu.—Sat., April 20-22, $32-$44, Annenberg Center, 3680 Walnut St., 215-898-3900, www.pennpresents.org.