A History of Country Dancing
with an emphasis on the steps
Anne Daye, HDS Director of Education and Research
The Georgian Country Dance
The first half of the eighteenth century was the heyday of the longways country dance for as many as will, as good footwork was combined with intricate and challenging figures in a dance genre enjoyed by the highest and lowest of the nation. Tomlinson includes a chapter on the country dance, saying ‘it is become as it were the Darling or favourite Diversion of all Ranks of People from the Court to the Cottage in their different Manners of Dancing’.
The country dance was the staple of the court ball, family parties and the assembly rooms, following in the programme after the high demands of solo couples executing the French dances (in elite circles) and the minuets in assemblies. French steps continued to be used, and some dances specifically mention steps such as the rigaudon step. Footing was also called for, typically when setting in place to a partner. Footing steps are described by Francis Peacock in Sketches Relative 1806. Footing steps or pas anglois were recorded by German masters Lang 1762 and Petersen 1768 (Minuet to Mazurka 1745 – 1845 includes examples). Based on the back skip with variants, footing steps are arguably a native vocabulary of steps in Britain and the foundation for elaboration into complex steps for Scottish, Irish and English step-dancing. For example, the Irish basic sequence called ‘seven and two threes’ is a double footing step followed by two single footings. Now lost to the record, there would also have been a range of hornpipe steps for 3/2 hornpipe tunes and jig or slip-jig steps for 6/8 and 9/8 tunes.
The Regency and Victorian Country Dance
After the 1760s, the country dance underwent another significant change. The longways form became simpler and less inventive in figuring. The head couple could devise a sequence of figures just before starting to dance. Publishers sold music on the back of dances, with very brief instructions at the bottom of a tune. Popular tunes were issued by different publishers, each adding a different set of figures.
The stepping conventions began to shift too, but the development is more difficult to analyse than that of the 1680s. There is very little information on stepping in any dance manuals. The chassée, now like a forward travelling skip-change, began to replace the pas de bourée/fleuret, and skipping was probably a common move. Hornpipe steps were used in the common-time hornpipe, and Irish steps were needed for 9/8 tunes (now often called ‘Irish jigs’).
Bibliography
Minuet to Mazurka 1745 – 1845. DHDS Summer School book 2001
Daye, A. ‘Finding our Footing: a discussion of the evidence for a social dance step vernacular to these islands’ in Bennet, T. (ed.) Stepping On: Proceedings of the 2019 Conference on Stepping in Dance. London: English folk Dance & Song Society 2023, pp. 51 – 65.
Lang, C. C. Anfangs-Grtinde zu der Tanzkunst, Erlangen 1765
Lang, C. C. Anfangsgrtinde zur Tanzkunst, Erlangen 1751
Lang, C. C. Choreographische Vorstellung der Englischen und Franzosischen Figuren, Erlangen 1762
Daye, A. ‘Finding our Footing: a discussion of the evidence for a social dance step vernacular to these islands’ in Bennet, T. (ed.) Stepping On: Proceedings of the 2019 Conference on Stepping in Dance. London: English folk Dance & Song Society 2023, pp. 51 – 65.
Lang, C. C. Anfangs-Grtinde zu der Tanzkunst, Erlangen 1765
Lang, C. C. Anfangsgrtinde zur Tanzkunst, Erlangen 1751
Lang, C. C. Choreographische Vorstellung der Englischen und Franzosischen Figuren, Erlangen 1762
Petersen, T. F. Prachtische Einleitung in die Chorégraphie, Hamburg 1768
Petersen, T. F. Praktische Einleitung in die Choregraphie, Schleswig 1791
Petersen, T. F. Prachtische Einleitung in die Chorégraphie, Hamburg 1768
Petersen, T. F. Praktische Einleitung in die Choregraphie, Schleswig 1791
Tomlinson, K. (1735) The Art of Dancing and Six Dances. London: Tomlinson. Facsimile reprint: New York, Gregg 1970