Colorado Ballet's triple bill begins with a bang, quiets to a whisper and ends with a bigger bang, delivering one of the company's most satisfying offerings.

That said, attendance was low for the Sunday matinee of Dance Creations at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House, suggesting that local ballet-goers prefer toe shoes and tutus to the sort of adventurous, imaginative and thoroughly engrossing dance seen in this season-ending program.

No point in assigning win, place and show, since each piece occupies a separate universe.

The subtlest of the three was Jessica Lang's new De Profundis, set to the captivating, motionless instrumental and choral music of Arvo Part. Dancers are garbed in exaggerated white outfits: the men wearing skirts that surround them like a spotlight, while the women's extended sleeves are thrown out into space, a lá Martha Graham.

It's captivating from the start, with a dancer suspended above the stage, angel-like. There are no dramatic leaps or eye-catching solos, just lovely movement that perfectly reflects the music's ethereal tone.

Sunday's program kicked off with its most inventive piece, the premiere of Second Exposure, by Darrell Grand Moultrie.

The audience enters the hall to find the curtain raised and the dancers warming up. Once the stage empties, the curtain descends to just above the floor as barefoot dancers roll downstage for solos, backed by pairs of legs visible from under the curtain. How's that for different?

The music, a propulsive percussion score from Brazilian-born Ricardo Romaneiro, inspires the choreographer to send dancers flying about the stage. Often, they're captured in mid-jeté and carried into the wings. There's a lively sense of perpetual motion as patterns of dancers keep the eyes constantly entertained.

Like Lang's piece, Exposure is an ensemble work, with individual moments never quite developing into solos. Thanks to Romaneiro's fanciful use of all manner of percussion, the soundtrack seldom turns wearying or repetitive. Still, the piece does go on a few minutes too long.

The program appropriately ended with Celts, Lila York's rousing, foot-tapping salute to the music, dance and lore of Ireland. An ensemble work set to traditional tunes by The Chieftains and others, this marvelously performed suite deftly mixes armless step-dancing maneuvers with the leaps and turns of classical ballet.

It's not Riverdance, nor does it want to be. The machine-gun tapping so prevalent in step- dancing is nowhere to be heard. Instead, the dancers move silently through ensemble segments, flashy duets and solos, the latter turned brilliantly by that whirling dervish Koichi Kubo.

There's macho muscularity in a Celtic Warrior segment and a dreamy tenderness in a piece about a sailor lost at sea (with swaying, floor-bound women depicting the waves). Naturally, all that precision dancing and irresistible music brought the small but appreciative crowd to its feet.

Colorado Ballet

• Grade: A-

• When and where: continues at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday

• Cost: $27 to $143

• Information: 303-837-8888

Marc Shulgold is the music and dance writer. Shulgoldm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5296