Visiting choreographer James Jordan, ballet master for the Kansas City Ballet, works with dance students in the Annelise Mertz Dance Studio. Jordan has been in residence with the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences three times this semester — most recently Nov. 9-13 — to set “Dark Elegies,” a poignant modern ballet by Antony Tudor (1908-1987). The piece, which was selected to mark the centennial of Tudor’s birth, was originally choreographed in 1937 and draws on the vocabulary of classical ballet to depict a community in mourning, with the dancers resembling grieving parents. Jordan’s setting will be performed as part of “Common Ground,” the 2008 Washington University Dance Theatre concert that takes place in Edison Theatre Dec. 5-7.