Feu Follet.

A patchwork of delights and distractions make up Feu Follet, the intriguing new work by Elisa Monte Dance. A celebration of Cajun culture, the two-act production offers among its attributes dynamic choreography by Monte and David Brown and a soaring original score by Richard Peaslee. It also draws on the virtuosity of the seven-member company, highlighting both individual and ensemble wizardry.

Following an out-of-kilter premiere for the Performing Arts Society of Acadiana in Lafayette--the very bosom of Cajun country--Feu Follet found its focus two nights later when it opened the New Orleans Ballet Association's current season.

Feu Follet--a colloquial term referring to strange lights on the bayous--traces the history of the Acadian people from seventeenth-century France through their migration to Nova Scotia to their forced expulsion to the swamplands of southwestern Louisiana. Drawing on literary sources, including Longfellow's poem Evangeline, and the Cajuns' rich musical heritage, Monte, Brown, and Peaslee created what is not so much a historical chronicle as an interpretive synthesis of their own reactions to this epic story.

From variations on community jigs and hoedowns to more elaborate, character-driven sequences, the dancing is best when elegant Malek Sebai and muscled, graceful Christian Canciani take center stage as the doomed lovers, Evangeline and Gabriel.

The highlight of the evening is the wild and haunting finale to Act I, "Le Grand Derangement." Moodily lit by Susan Roth and danced to Peaslee's pounding, percussive underscoring, the moment erupts in wrenching melodrama as the lovers, along with families and friends, are separated and exiled. Here the choreography achieves a beautiful, hell-bent fury as it effortlessly intertwines narrative and emotion.

So satisfying is this segment that one can almost willingly overlook the work's shortcomings. A spoken prologue is flimsy and useless; having a dancer narrate what are essentially program notes proclaiming the glory of the Cajun people is a curious way to get things started, especially when Brown and Monte's affection for this culture soon becomes obvious through their jubilant choreography.

Other contrivances include a Cajun storyteller meandering among dancers whose footwork is far more interesting than his anecdotes. And the presence of an onstage band, even one as terrific as the New Orleans-based Mamou, too often locates the performance in a contemporary dance hall, undercutting the grand scale of a cultural experience encompassing three centuries and two continents.

What makes Feu Follet so memorable is, ultimately, and quite simply, dance and music. Nothing else really matters.