Dances for Queen Victoria

Music and instructions for country dances, quadrilles, polka, schottische and reels

by Joseph Lowe, dancing master to the royal family

This publication makes available to dancers today a collection of dances that were taught to Queen Victoria’s children, accompanied with new recordings of the music and new essays that shed light on the collection’s historical context and significance.

Joseph Lowe, one of the leading dancing masters of Edinburgh, was employed twice a year as dancing master to Queen Victoria’s children at Balmoral and Windsor. The diary he kept of these visits provide a rich context for the dances, alongside the publications of the Lowe family of dancing teachers and other contemporaries.

Joseph Lowe’s published dances set the standard for glamorous Victorian ballroom accomplishments – as the collection’s original title boasts: Lowe’s Selection of Popular Country Dances; with their proper figures as danced in fashionable society. To which is added a Favourite Quadrille, Polka, Waltz, Schottische, etc., etc. Dedicated by Permission to Her Royal Highness Victoria Adelaide Mary Louise, Princess Royal. Some of these dances are still current at English and Scottish country dance balls and Irish céilís, while others are here revived.

Lowe’s Selection is of great interest not only for its royal connection but also for the innovative and easy-to-follow way in which it lays out the musical notation and dance instructions. Piano settings of the ballroom repertoire of England, Scotland and Ireland are presented alongside dance instructions clearly matched to each strain of music. This format made it suitable for playing and dancing at home or in social gatherings without a full band and doubtless added to its popularity at the time. This edition comes with 2 CDs, bringing the band to you!

Dances for Queen Victoria is a new edition of Lowe’s Selection. Following Lowe’s text in modern typeface, it provides further guidance and notes on each dance; additional dance instructions where needed; vocabularies of steps, figures and formations; illustrations and diagrams; and a full facsimile of the original publication from a copy in the National Library of Scotland – making it the definitive resource for dancers and researchers alike.

New essays by dance historians illuminate the life of Joseph Lowe and the sources for quadrille and country dance steps, to encourage readers to go back to original sources.

This publication will be of interest to country and set dance communities as well as historical dancers, and to anyone with an interest in nineteenth-century royal and/or cultural history.

Credits:

Edited by Anne Daye and Ian Cutts, with notes and essays by Anne Daye, Ian Cutts and Paul Cooper

The CDs were recorded with Norman McSween (flute), Ian Cutts (violin), Jeanette Edwards (cello) and Gail Ford (piano).

Track List:

Note that if digital download is selected, the book is supplied in PDF format and the CDs are supplied in MP3 format.

All rights reserved, public performance or broadcasting without permission is prohibited. When used for teaching, recognition must be given to The Historical Dance Society.
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