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Overview |
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| 1. The Long Way Home The Poor Man's Dream / A Dangerous Quest / Caught with Thieves / The Treasure beneath the Fountain 4:40 The people of Dudelsac see in this dance the triumph of consensual promiscuity - the tune titles telling the whole tale. Christianity came late to the Valley of Earthly Delights and sometimes it seemed it may never have come at all for in Bordonia pagan partner swapping persisted through the pealing of church bells, the turmoil of the reformation and the edicts of the counter-reformation. The people of Nenjira, however, see in this dance a very different tale - that of one of their many 18th century military defeats. Although preferring to keep to themselves, events would occasionally force the Bordonians to take up arms. On one such occasion, after a brief sortie, the Bordonian force lost track of the Prussian one around the shores of one of their lakes, only to suddenly come back upon them and be driven into the forest. As the dance makes clear, there they eluded the Prussians a second time but were caught and dragged captive from the forest by a competing Austrian force. Some informants make one or other of the forces Russian, Polish, Hungarian, Bavarian, Saxon or French, and some even have the debacle repeated at the hands of a series of enemies - seeming only to illustrate further the meagreness of the Bordonians' military achievement. While every other nation has had its day of glory, Bordonia seems to have repeatedly missed history's cue. 2. Cozy Contra Jig in the Dirt / Restless Night / An Unlikely Lullaby Today 'contra' usually means a longways set for as many as will in which couples progress, dancing with different opposite couples in minor sets along the way. In earlier days, however, a 'contra' did not need to involve such a progression. In 1623 De Lauze refers to 'Contredanse' as being a characteristic English dance - but English dance of this period did not involve the repetition of figures in minor sets, simply the dancing of couples in longways sets. A 'contra' did not, however, need to be longways. In his 1703 Recueil de Contredanse, Feuillet described a contredanse in which couples dance with opposites across a square (the precursor to the quadrille). The essence of a 'contra', that which really distinguished it from other dances, was thus the dancing with opposites. From its probable origins in the Italian 'contra-danza', analogous to singing terminology, however, the term went on to litter dance names across Europe. It even possibly encouraged the use in English of the term 'country dancing' where 'folk', 'village' or 'low' dance might otherwise have been expected (whether by mistake or a desire to naturalise 'catholic' terms from the continent). This particularly compact Bordonian 'contra' appears to have been composed to suit cottage dancing. Even the tunes save space as jigs encourage dancers to bounce up and down rather than make expansive travelling steps. 3. Wedding Bell Waltz The Wake-Washed Island The Swan-Rippled Sunset / The Carillon's Call From the Medieval choral dances - involving as they did some serpentine figures, some footwork and some coupling up, evolved most European social dance forms. In Eastern Europe folk stayed in the line but the rudimentary stamping evolved into more complicated footwork. In north western Europe the serpentine weaving evolved into flowing country dances. In Alpine Central Europe the intermittent breaking from the line to turn a partner evolved in elaborate couples dances. This dance would seem to have its beginning in the 17th century Alps and its end in the 19th century ballroom. The turning and twisting tell the tale of a wedding - the alternating solo turns being the exchanging of vows, the turning under joined hands, the entering of the church, and the balancing and swapping over, the ringing of the bells (the Bordonians interest in bell music having outlived their interest in church attendance, so that while churches fall into disuse, dedicated bell towers continued to be built on the shores of Bordonia's lakes). The final figure, the ballroom waltz, symbolises the wedding reception, and betrays the dance as having reached its final form only since the advent of smooth dance floors. In a pre-ballroom non-progressive form the dance was once performed by wedding guests leading the bride to the groom's home, even if that meant dancing all the way from one village to another. 4. Greetings at the Crossroads The Herb-Lined Lane / Apple-Tree Shade / The Painted Cottage Although the precious landscape has been changing with each passing decade, the green hedged country-side of Bordonia was once criss-crossed with lanes and by-ways. These, as the title of the tunes suggest, were often lined by herbs - and it was not always left up to nature to decide which herbs would grow where. Bordonians cultivated every conceivable herb on public as well as private land. Indeed, the title of John Parkinson's 1629 herb book Paradisi in Sole Paradisus Terrestris 'Park-in-Sun's Earthly Paradise' represents not simply a pun on the author's name but also evidence that the author, nearly 20 years before English mercenaries arrived there, knew of the Valley of Earthly Delights (referred to in early Latin texts as Paradisus Terrestris) and its incomparable herb gardens. Where the herb-lined Bordonian lanes met, so too did folk. Some cross-roads became favourite spots for summer dances. Old doors would be brought out on carts and thrown on the ground for zesty displays of step-dancing, a vigorous Bordonian tradition though not one explored by D'Honger in this collection. The dirt road itself would be cleared of loose rocks and smoothed with rakes to make a still bigger surface for social dance. This particular dance, with its giving of hands, alludes to the custom of shaking hand with everyone one met as one travelled down these by-ways. 5. Vintage Footwork Harvest Bourr¯e / Pressing the Fruit / The Yuletide Feast In the early 17th century Bordonians became so besotted by the brisk stepping, twirling and crossing possibilities of the French bourr¯e, that they tried to import and adapt to their climate the grape-growing culture which gave the dance such life in the Auvergne. Though the hard work was soon forsaken, the harvest festival lived on with imaginary grapes being crushed in dances such as this one. The purpose of this dance did not, however, end there. Irrespective of the tale a particular dance may tell, as a social activity dancing invariably also served to facilitate courtship. Thus, young people, according to Arbeau, in his 1589 Orchesographie, practise dancing 'to reveal whether lovers are in good health and sound of limb, after which they are permitted to kiss their mistress in order that they may touch and savour one another, thus to ascertain if they are shapely or emit an unpleasant odour as of bad meat.' Older people, according to Robert Smith Surt¯es in his 1865 Mr Facey Romford's Hounds do not just go to balls to dance for as 'everyone knows that the real business of a ball is either to look out for a wife, to look after a wife, or to look after somebody else's wife.' In this dance, couples overtly check each other - dancing straight towards each other, showing off for each other, and slowing regarding, perhaps even smelling, each other before deciding to move on. 6. Giddy Promenade Longing to Dance / Arm in Arm / Feet in a Frenzy In Dudelsac this dance is enjoyed purely for its game-like quality and to add a fun urgency to the search for new opposites the preference is for an odd number of couples - the odd couple out each time being obliged to fill in 32 bars of music with free dancing. There is no sense in Dudelsac that the dance has a deeper significance and though the villagers feel that the tunes they use tell the story of someone who had been waiting for a partner, found one and was then swept away, they do not see the dance itself as telling a story. In Nenjira, however, the villagers take their own more frequently used name for this dance, The Clockwork Walk, as confirmation of their belief that the dance commemorates the advent in the Valley of new timekeeping technology. It is not, however, the superficial rotation of the hour and minute hands which they see in the dance, it is the inner workings of a hand held clocks. In the dancers' alternating right and left hand stars they see the ever oscillating spoked balance wheel which in the later half of the 17th century afforded a regulation system in the absence of a pendulum and made portability possible. In the other casts and turns they see the action of the balance spring, escape wheel, main spring and great wheel - a harmony of cogs linked with the harmony of the spheres. The dance is a celebration of being able to walk with the universe in your pocket. 7. The Albert Hall Pavan Studied Gravity / Virginal Modesty / A Grand Masquerade The Albert Hall was the grandest dance venue in the 17th century Bordonian capital of Terpsichorea, but this showy dance has its origins in the solemn 'peacock' dance of 16th century Italy, Spain and France. Bordonians adapted the dance to their own taste by changing a very slow singles and double sequence to two sets of walked slow, slow, quick, quick, quick steps. They also embroidered the figures - to the extent of making what was originally a processional dance progressive. The attached Bordonian tunes were clearly later self-conscious inventions by someone familiar with dance history - probably Jan D'Honger himself - for the names of all three echo words in Arbeau's 1589 Orch¯sographie: 'A cavalier may dance the pavan wearing his cloak and sword, and others, such as you, dressed in your long gowns, walking with decorum and studied gravity. And the damsels with demure mien, their eyes lowered save to cast an occasional glance of virginal modesty at the onlookers. On solemn feast days the pavan is employed by kings, princes and great noblemen to display themselves ,,, Pavans are also used in masquerades to herald the entrance of the gods and goddesses in their triumphal chariots or emperors and kings in full majesty.' The Bordonians love masquerade balls and the opportunity they presented for sending up the aristocracy they were fortunate enough not to have. 8. The Carousel Waltz The Merry Go Round / Another Go / Around Again Here is another flowing group waltz in which partners are changed almost indiscernibly and the waltzing as a couple starts in the hold and position most favoured in early times. These days a man will take his partner's lead hand in an angular palm-to-palm grip, will start facing along the line-of-dance and will step around his partner with his left foot. In the olden days, however, they much preferred to have the fingers of the woman's palm-down right hand gently supported by the fingers of the man's palm-down cupped left hand, and to have men starting back to the line-of-dance and stepping straight back with their left foot while the woman, showing no fear, steps straight forward toward the man with her right foot. The couple would rise and turn half-way around on their second and third step and then repeat the sequence with each taking the other's role - the woman stepping back along the line-of-dance with her left while the man steps directly forward with his right and both again turning half-way. A waltz such as this can be as pleasantly dizzy as a fairground ride. Indeed, the dance and tunes were said to be inspired by one of Europe's first merry-go-rounds, that in the amusement quarter of old Terpsichorea. Needless to say, on such an amusement every is followed with a plea to have another go and to go around again. 9. The Devil's Mill Keep Your Promises / Don't Talk to Strangers / Work for Your Oats / Pay for Your Barley This dance is of interest, not simply for being a led dance - indicative of a very early origin - but for being led from both ends simultaneously, quite rare, and for incorporating set figures and a leadership progression, as in English pattern dancing. The autochthonous origins of the dance are, however, evident in the fulsome watermill imagery. Bordonia once relied completely on its many and varied watermills. All three of the main mill types are depicted in this dance - the 'undershot', the 'overshot' and, in the penultimate figure when the leaders change wheels mid-stream, the 'breastshot'. The imagery continues in the fact that the end and the beginning of the dance flow into one another. The meaning of the tune titles is less clear. Does 'work for one's oats' mean to work hard on one's own oat crop or work hard to raise a surplus of something else to trade for oats? Does 'pay for one's barley' mean Bordonians did not grow barley themselves or that they needed to pay the miller to grind it for them? Perhaps, as the people of Dudelsac suggest, the dance and tunes are simply a record of the hardship of rural life. Perhaps, as those in Nenjira argue, they are warnings against reckless behaviour, such as drinking too much barley water - the tune titles coming from an early manual of manners and the dance depicting sinners being ground in the devil's own mill. 10. The Cloverleaf Waltz Westlake Waltz / Invisible City Dances for trios have a long history and take us to the threshold of couples dancing. This dance, involving as it does intermittent coupling up, actually crosses that threshold. The origin of the trio dance is unclear, but there still survive some Bordonian dances which involve two men and one woman and mime bride-stealing. Whether because an elevation in social mores has rendered this theme less tasteful or because an elevation in dance styles has left fewer men on the dance floor, such dances are rarely called these days. The most popular Bordonian trios over the last two hundred years resemble other European trios, from the 16th century French basse dance and the Russian 'troika' to the three person rheinlÌnders and lÌndlers of the Germans and Austrians, by involving one man and two women, and playing on the man's courting dilemna. This particular dance gives each woman an opportunity to dance solo, swishing her full-pleated skirt - once necessary to keep it out of the mud. The tunes are clearly an allusion to Bordonian geography - the ancient capital of Terpsichorea being hidden between forests and lakes. The only known map ever to show the way to this city hung in the city itself, a giant silk tapestry filling one wall of the main ballroom. During the 1840s drought it was set alight so its precious gold threads could be used to pay for repairs to the ballroom floor. 11. Travels in Good Company Off to Cuppacumbalong / The Happy Event / Life at a Jig Bordonians frown on dance competitions but once a year hold a fiercely contested one. Prizes are awarded in many categories, including the worst possible dance - where it is not the most tedious or difficult dance which is likely to win, but the most counter intuitive or socially unsatisfying. The finale and best attended part of the day is the live team calling event. The judge randomly pairs-up would-be callers and invites volunteer dancers to line up in a particular formation ready for instruction. Alternating between them, the callers must invent and walk the amused, sometime bemused, dancers through 8 bars worth of dance figures - trying all the time to make the figures flow out of the previous figure in a potentially useful direction. If a dance falls apart, the callers are eliminated. If their dance holds they have their names shuffled into new pairs and are challenged again - the threshold being raised so that even if the dance falls apart in story-line alone they are eliminated. On one such evening an astute dancing master was paired in a final with a mischievous lad whose first dance had been lucky to hold together - having been dared, it seemed, to simply repeat the first callers' words. The lad and his sponsors were amazed when the experienced caller, factoring in the anticipated echo, had the dancers calling for an encore of the resulting dance - here described. 12. Busy Fellows Frockcoat Fanfare / Fobwatch in Hand / The Forgotten Appointment / Impossible Choice In art today it is common to make a parody of courtship rituals, marriage, family relations and the boundaries set by social obligations. In 18th century and early 19th century Bordonia, however, despite the Bordonians' reputation as free-loving the boundaries set by social obligations were taken very seriously. Indeed, it was as if philandery would not be as sweet if monogamy not so expected, the game of love less fun if it were not framed by polite necessity. One such necessity was that gentlemen, no matter what other machinations or assignations they might arrange, should not introduce themselves directly to ladies and should use go-betweens to reveal their romantic interest. The people of Nenjira see this necessity behind the evolution of the contra-corner figure central to this dance - the men using each other to meet the ladies in the other's company and never going directly to them. The people of Dudelsac, though equally aware of the importance of arrangements as a spring board for their spontaneous life-style, prefer to see this particular figure as a relic of a much earlier animist age when men would raise their arms like antlers, lower their heads like rutting stags and throw themselves alternately at each other, interlocking elbows or fists, and at the young women looking on, as if competing for does. Accordingly, in Dudelsac men will often snort when dancing this dance. 13. The Palindrome Down to the Sea / Hopping Hot / A Chilly Dip Sieges were so common during the Thirty Years War that one colonel, identified variously as Austrian or Swedish, was always looking for a different way to amuse himself at the expense of captured townsfolk. Before long it was the unfortunate Bordonians turn. Upon the fall of Terpsichorea he demanded the inhabitants offer him and his officers an evening's entertainment. First he summoned the town's singers. They were just half way through their first song when he demanded they sing backwards. Try as they might they could not reverse the verse and laughing the colonel signalled for them to be killed. Next he summoned the musicians, but they too, when interrupted half-way and ordered to play backwards, fell into disarray and were led away. A similar fate befell in turn the actors, jugglers and tumblers - but when the dancers were called they were ready. They had quickly devised a dance, the second half of which was but the first half backwards - with figures danced in reverse direction and order. This time it was the officers who fell into disarray, the more so when they realised that this perfect palindrome included a partner progression. Other Bordonians joined in the dance turning a small triumph into a major victory and forcing the officers to leave in disgrace. The dance has been danced every year since. The tune titles possibly allude to tortures suffered. 14. Bodice and Doublet Warm Breeze / The Tussled Sheets / The Language of Paradise In Dudelsac this triple minor and thus probably early 18th century dance is called 'Bodice and Doublet, Corset and Trews' and is seen to be replete with the images of seduction - in particular the untying and unlacing of various layers of garments, the female bodice and corset (laced at the front and back respectively - except during pregnancy when laced at the side) and the male doublet and trews (the former laced at the front and cuffs, the latter onto the bottom of the former). Eventually the eager couple take to the sheets to communicate in the spirit of Adam and Eve. The people of Nenjira more soberly see in this dance and these tunes nostalgic images of early-18th century Bordonian life - the lacing up of fine clothes, the hanging out of washing to dry in a fair breeze and the free use of their native language which, though a curiosity to neighbouring folk, they themselves considered a language of the purest pedigree. Indeed, though Bordonians are not as ready as visitors to see their world as a remnant of the paradise in which Adam and Eve woke, many do see their language as a remnant of that which Adam and Eve spoke. Unfortunately, just as hundreds of indigenous languages across the world have been displaced by English, Spanish, Russian, Arabic and other major tongues so old Bordonian has been gradually replaced by Wendish and, more recently, German. 15. Juggling Partners A Smile Glimpsed / A Conversation Struck / An Invitation Extended / A New Romance The annual festival which commemorates the Bordonians rising to the challenge of an occupying force to dance backwards and, by so doing routing them, has given rise to many other dance palindromes - including this diagonal one. This dance, though slightly more challenging than the earlier palindrome, consists of nothing more than four figures danced with four successive partners. At the beginning of each sequence a new partner is welcomed with a smile and do-si-do and the 4th acquaintance from the last sequence is forgotten. In the second half of the sequence the coil of intimacy diminishes until yet another new partner comes into view. Dancers continue thus, juggling multiple partners, enjoying with each a progressively more intimate figures till a full two hand turn has been shared. The happy stages of this love cycle are marked out in the tune names and reflected in the changing mood within the set, from delicacy in the first tune and awkwardness in the second to the hope in the third and elation in the fourth. As always the Bordonians only ever dealt with the upside of the cycle in their dance music, preferring to express the down-swinging side in their ballads. Indeed, as if to ensure a healthy balance to any evenings festivities, brackets of dances are invariably separated by beautifully poetic songs of betrayal, remorse, jealously, bitterness, grief and hatred. 16. Love's Labour Aelfric's Arrival / The Enchanted World This dance is close in form to the 'rheinlÌnder' which had been danced all over German lands in the 18th century and which, a century later, under the name of 'schottische', rode on the coat tails of the polka to a degree of ballroom acceptance. Warne's Ballroom Guide called the schottische irretrievably vulgar, suggested it is 'danced less than the Polka in the upper circles' but admitted that it was still a favourite 'with children and young people.' Two, three and four person variants spread east to Poland, north to Scandinavia, south to Slovenia and west to the New World. This particular Bordonian invention thematically belongs to the family of dances commemorating the birth of a child, a favourite dance subject in Bordonia. The centre piece of what an outsider might see as a naming or christening day was usually the dedication to the child of a dance especially composed by a family member or friend to capture some of the happenings peculiar to the birth. This particular dance records the birth of Jan D'Honger's third child, Aelfric - old English for 'Elf king' - once a very popular name. From the dance and the tunes it is clear the labour had three stages, the mother and mid-wife worked well together and the boy was delivered quickly. After a quiet period taking in his new surrounding, Aelfric announced loudly that he had arrived. |
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