Dancing to his dazzling tune

Sex, shoes, snogging. It's what we like about Sex And The City. However, it's not what you expect from Mikhail Baryshnikov, world-class dancer, Soviet-era defector and onetime director of American Ballet Theatre. In the New York TV rom-com he makes a guest appearance playing Aleksandr Petrovsky, a "famed Russian artist", who makes a beeline for Carrie when she visits his gallery.

But while dance purists lament Baryshnikov's low-rent film and TV career - and it is truly lamentable (White Nights with Gregory Hines? Ugh) - he is still artistically ambitious, setting up his own arts centre in New York and chasing the best new choreography of our time. During the Nineties he commissioned it via his White Oak Dance Project, and now, having suspended White Oak, he's commissioning it for himself.

Given his pulling power, modern-day choreographers beat a path to his door, eager for the audiences who throng to his work. And so it was at the Barbican last night, a packed house for Baryshnikov and his programme of dances - five short solos and one group piece, some by choreographers little seen in the UK. All referred to ballet and Baryshnikov himself, spotlighting his career in some way, or commenting on his age. Accompanying him was Pedja Muzijevic, the Bosnian pianist who looks like an accountant but plays like an angel.

The first thing to say is that Baryshnikov looks great despite having just turned 56. Indeed, most men would be grateful to look like him at 36, let alone 46 or 50. The second is that he's nothing if not a smart cookie, choosing choreography that flatters his poise, which is still lovely, but goes easy on his jump, which is less than it was.

The third thing is that when Baryshnikov lightens up, he shines more brightly than he has done for years. Some of his recent work, the stuff by earnest American choreographers, looks plodding. Miles better was the piece by our very own Michael Clark, who created a larky, rolling, roving piece to The Beatles tune Back In the USSR.

In this, the only group work of the evening, Baryshnikov dazzled, clearly revved by Clark's on-stage presence, as first his younger shadow, and then his pacemaker, making him run and laugh to the rocking rhythms of the Fab Four. The Barbican crowd loved it, cheering Clark, Britain's bad boy of ballet, as he transformed a dancer of the Soviet old school.

Baryshnikov was also good in Mr XYZ, the closing solo where he danced with a walking cane, a tailor's dummy and an office chair. As he danced, the Barbican crew dismantled the stage, revealing its bare bones, as if to reveal Baryshnikov's life on stage, as well as the artifice and the process of his art. And just in the nick of time, they reassembled it, as if to say the show goes on. With anyone else, you'd be cringing. With Baryshnikov it felt true.

Less satisfying were Opus One by Lucinda Childs, and Indoor Man by Tere O'Connor. The latter had a few good jokes, but the former was too worthy, and overly reverential to the Baryshnikov brand. And maybe that's the key. Deference flattens Baryshnikov, and makes you wonder if he can sustain the show. But a challenge pulls him up, and it pulls us up too.

Solos With Piano Or Not..An Evening With Mikhail Baryshnikov