“I know I’m crazy, but I like the format.”

The format is a full‑length, abstract ballet. The crazy man is choreographer Ib Andersen.

Andersen, artistic director of Ballet Arizona since 2000, is at work on his second full‑length abstract ballet, which means he will so far have made twice as many as his illustrious former employer and mentor, George Balanchine. And that’s only if you count Balanchine’s “Jewels” as a true, full‑length piece, rather than an amalgam of three distinct ballets.

The point is not a small one. Without a story, a ballet depends only on a theme, or a dance vocabulary, or perhaps a group of images and/or musical pieces for unity. Most full‑lengths are story ballets: “Swan Lake,” “Nutcracker,” “Romeo and Juliet,” etc. It’s easier that way to maintain audience interest. It’s harder for a choreographer to sustain the imagination required to come up with new steps and combinations when the only reason to move is ... well, to move.

Balanchine was, among many other things, the unchallenged master of abstract ballet in the 20th century–or ever, for that matter. To see a typical Balanchine ballet is to be transported to a realm where movement has its own meaning. Words, stories, characters–these are irrelevant. The human body in space, accompanied by music, is everything.

But, how abstract is “abstract?” Balanchine famously said that whenever you put a man and a woman onstage, there is a story. Try an experiment: Walk down the street and make yourself aware of your movements and the movements of others around you. People are hurrying places alone, or strolling in couples, or wandering. These are stories without words. Put music to them in your head and you have the beginnings, in a way, of an abstract ballet. Put professional dancers onstage under the direction of an imaginative and inventive choreographer, and you have the potential for a masterpiece.

Andersen’s “Mosaik” was, by any standards, such a masterpiece. His first full‑length abstract, made in 2004, explored an evolutionary theme, movement growing from simple gestures to ever‑increasing complexity. The new one, called “Play,” will be altogether different. Says Andersen:

“‘'Mosaik’ was linear, it was one ballet. This is basically seven different ballets. But I see it as a seven‑course meal.”

“I wanted to make a very physical ballet,” he adds. “In a vague way, the word ‘play’ connects the seven into one. I see play as part of the creative process.”

There are only so many ways the body can move on its own. It can walk, run, turn, jump, crawl. With another body, it can walk or run in tandem, lift or be lifted, turn or be turned, drag or be dragged. Many bodies together can do all these things in myriad combinations, plus array themselves to make unlimited patterns. Seeing the first half of Andersen’s new ballet in rehearsal recently, it’s evident Andersen has left not one possibility unexplored. “Play” might be retitled “The Joy of Movement.”

Strange factoid: More books have been written and published about the late choreographer George Balanchine than about any historical figure other than Napoleon Bonaparte. People who love dance are fascinated by this artist who made classical ballet into a vehicle for everyday emotions. (And if you don’t believe me, see or somehow get a video/DVD, of “Agon.”)

Balanchine made dance central to American expression. Hard to believe now, but in the 1970s dance performance–and especially contemporary ballet–was as American as “American Idol” is now. With Balanchine’s death in 1983, the people who danced for him at New York City Ballet dispersed to distant places, some of them to become choreographers themselves in an attempt to continue the tradition begun by “Mr. B.”

I have seen ballets by several of these choreographers, and without hesitation I can say that Andersen’s ballets are light years ahead of the others. I don’t know how it is that Terpsichore chose Phoenix as Andersen’s home, but we should all thank the muse for the gift.

“Play” premieres June 8‑10 at Phoenix Symphony Hall. Visit balletaz.org for more information.