The choreographer Ben Munisteri started out dancing in clubs, and until now, his primary mode of dancemaking has been the remix. He freely combines arabesques and yoga poses, jazz moves, and club moves. His reconstituted music is equally wide-ranging: He has been known to combine Debussy with Devo and barking dogs.

Mr. Munisteri’s “Tuesday, 4 a.m.,” which had its premiere Wednesday night, marks a startling departure. For one thing, it is set entirely to one grand piece of classical music. For another, that piece is Stravinsky’s “Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra” – better known as the music of Balanchine’s “Rubies.” And while the blend of movement is as eclectic as ever, “Tuesday, 4 a.m.” is a structured dance – the kind of traditional work Mr. Munisteri has, until now, declined to create.

Having seen the results of Mr. Munisteri’s self-described “formalist plunge,” one can only ask: Why did he wait so long?

“Tuesday, 4 a.m.” is a splendid dance whose small beauties and whimsical flourishes are pieced into a satisfying overarching design. The dance covers horizontal space with sweep and verve – then shifts focus, placing three couples in a staggered line. There is an assured flow to these movements, as if their architect was working in clear, intuitive bursts. And the choice of Stravinsky is inspired – his headstrong music pairs well with Mr. Munisteri’s love of spontaneous digressions and unexpected counts.

As the first resounding notes ring out in “Tuesday, 4 a.m.” a red ball of sun drops with tongue-in-cheek speed and a moon rises. Blank-faced men and women in white nightgowns and pajamas come flying across the diagonal. A pair of dancers jumps invisible hurdles; a man does a handstand. It’s as if all the children had crawled out of bed and snuck into the night nursery.

As Mr. Munisteri assembles and takes apart his duos and trios and quartets, motifs are layered through the whole.Jetes weave in and out; one partner jumps on the other’s back and knocks on his shoulder with a closed fist. An athletic motif resurfaces in various forms: the hurdlers, a football huddle, a sequence of jumping jacks. Partners yank each other by the hand, pulling on the full length of the arm. Dancers slide on their backs across the floor, pushed along by their own feet.

All of this looks, well, elegant. And the costumes, by Katherine McDowell, suggest the grace of ballet without its fussiness – a stage full of Claras. The impressive lighting design (BY 2004 Bessie winner Kathy Kaufmann) includes one glorious section in which gorgeous, blurred, colored chunks materialize on the glossy floor; it’s like dancing on a candy dish.

“Tuesday, 4 a.m.” lacks a strong sense of closure, however. Like some pop songs, Mr. Munisteri’s dances tend to fade out, rather than striking a last chord.

Up to this point,Mr.Munisteri has often eschewed the traditional pleasures of dance – harmonious music, expressive faces, flowing phrases – in favor of his remixes. He has chopped up the music, stifled emotion, and cut and pasted dance moves into his own irregular, idiosyncratic fabric. In the other three dances on the program, this shredding is interesting, but it only stretches so far before it becomes thin.What “Tuesday, 4 a.m.” shows is that he is now willing to put Humpty together again, to harness his considerable choreographic gifts and musicality to create more mature, satisfying work.

January 20 at 7:30 p.m. & 10 p.m., and January 21 at 7:30 p.m. (219 W. 19th Street, 212-691-6500).