音樂欣賞
Music Appreciation
Dance in the 17th Century

In the 17th century dance



a fundamental social grace
a means of training the body for polite society,
as an art increased.
French monarchy,





Dance achieved official recognition through the establishment in
1661 of the Académie Royale de Danse (eight years before a similar
academy was founded to support opera
During this period dance technique advanced rapidly, and the
vocabulary it engendered – much of it still in use in ballet today –
radiated along with French dances out to the rest of Europe.
French dancing absorbed influences from other countries,
especially Italy, Spain and, later in the century, England.
Across Europe dance was not only a necessary practice for those
wishing to demonstrate (or to achieve) social standing, but also a
fundamental element in such politically charged spectacles as court
balls and ballets. The rhythms of the dance even penetrated such
genres as sacred music.
Dance Categories

Two broad and overlapping categories:
dance music composed to set dancers in motion functional dance
dance music intended for listening. stylized dance
differences can be observed in both instrumentation and repertory.
In France, the primary instrument for accompanying dancing was the violin
Dancing-masters were often violinists who composed their own music.
 Outside France dance was sometimes accompanied by plucked string
instruments – the lute in Italy and the guitar in Spain. Functional dance
music was generally performed by consorts – primarily members of the
violin family, but also double reeds – or, as the century progressed, by the
emerging orchestra.
 On the other hand, the dance music found in suites for solo lute or
harpsichord, and later for viol, flute or other melody instrument with
continuo, was composed for listening. As a consequence of this distinction,
the repertory for such ensembles as the 24 Violons du Roi (also known as
the grands violons), which played for balls and ballets, differs in content
from the solo suites of composers such as Gaultier and Chambonnières in
France or Froberger in Germany. Although such dance types as the
courante and sarabande appear in both repertories, the various types of
branle are much more numerous in the functional dance literature,
whereas the allemande became one of the building-blocks of the Baroque
solo suite.
1.
2.


Dance Louis XIV


Preserved much of the music by Lully and his
predecessors, the king took an interest in having the
dances from his reign preserved as well.
During the 1680s at least three different systems of
choreographic notation were developed in France:
1. for the notation of contredanses, by André Lorin;
2. a schematic staff notation by Jean Favier, which preserves the only
completely choreographed theatrical work from the period,
3. a third system invented by Pierre Beauchamp, choreographer at
the court and the Paris Opéra, but exploited commercially by
Raoul-Auger Feuillet. Feuillet's book Chorégraphie, published in
1700, reached a wide audience throughout Europe. Not only
helping disseminate the French style of dance internationally, the
system was used by other dancing-masters and notators to
preserve their own.
Dance Louis XIV


By the end of the 17th century dance music composed for
listening had its own conventions and was preserved in
quite different types of sources. Whereas there was some
overlap between the two repertories in that dances
composed for the stage were frequently recycled for
listening – the arrangements of Lully's theatrical music into
trio suites arranged by key being a case in point –
The only known instances of a dance composed for a solo
or chamber suite later appearing on stage or in the
ballroom occurred when a composer borrowed from
himself. Rameau, for example, reused ‘Les sauvages’ from
his Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin of 1728 in his
opéra-ballet Les Indes galantes of 1735, but pieces by
composers who wrote for the salon, such as François
Couperin, do not appear in collections of practical dance
music.
1730–1800


The gradual disappearance of the suite did not lead to a decline in the
composition of dance music: not only did dance remain an important
component of theatrical entertainments throughout the 18th century,
but dance-based movements infiltrated almost every genre of
instrumental music, from the Italian opera overture to the solo sonata
to the Viennese Classical symphony, although their presence was
often masked by the simple tempo markings used to designate
movements.
Several Baroque dance types, such as the courante, almost ceased to
exist, whereas others, such as the gavotte, held on for considerably
longer, while new dance types emerged, particularly from central
Europe. On a technical level the division between social and theatrical
dance practices grew wider, but there remained some overlap in
repertory, and the dance types found in instrumental genres were
borrowed from both the stage and the ballroom. In the emerging
‘absolute’ instrumental music, composers began to treat dance as a
topos which could draw on both a web of cultural associations and
muscle memory.
1730–1800


Dancing remained an essential social grace in polite
society, and, while balls continued to take place in courts
and private homes, public venues also opened: many
opera houses began to host masked balls as a means of
increasing their revenues and other types of public dance
halls began to appear as the century progressed.
The emphasis on the minuet was to become even more
pronounced in later dance manuals. Although the
republication of a few of Pécour's danses à deux as late as
1780 shows that they had achieved the status of classics,
such dances were performed only at the most ceremonial
of balls or else studied in dancing lessons for their
pedagogic value; by mid-century social dancing was
dominated by the minuet and the contredanse.
1730–1800


Dancing remained an essential social grace in polite
society, and, while balls continued to take place in courts
and private homes, public venues also opened: many
opera houses began to host masked balls as a means of
increasing their revenues and other types of public dance
halls began to appear as the century progressed.
The emphasis on the minuet was to become even more
pronounced in later dance manuals. Although the
republication of a few of Pécour's danses à deux as late as
1780 shows that they had achieved the status of classics,
such dances were performed only at the most ceremonial
of balls or else studied in dancing lessons for their
pedagogic value; by mid-century social dancing was
dominated by the minuet and the contredanse.
Minuet




In the ballroom the minuet carried the weight of tradition and remained
a vehicle for demonstrating proper deportment and the disciplined use
of the body that was seen as essential for anyone aspiring to social
standing.
It remained primarily a dance for a single couple, while everyone else
in attendance watched. The minuet outlasted the French Revolution;
Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, among others, composed orchestral
minuets for the ballroom.
Moreover, the minuet remained in the theatrical repertory and can be
found in operas and ballets throughout the century. Most prominently, it
became the third movement of the Viennese Classical symphony and
string quartet, where it was not infrequently subjected to the
compositional manipulations of the high style (e.g. Mozart's Minuetto in
canone in the Quintet in C minor k406, 1787). Outside France the
Italianized version of the name (minuetto or tempo di minuetto) tended
to appear as the heading for a movement, but the minuet is not always
identified as such every time it appears; a movement headed ‘Rondo’,
for example, might be based on minuet rhythms.
Allemande


A term used generically during the late 18th in triple metre; it was eventually
replaced in general usage by the names of the two most common types, the
Ländler (in which couples turned with arms interlaced) and the Waltz (in which
they took swift turns while in a close embrace). It is difficult to say just when
the term ‘German Dance’ was first used, or when the French word Allemande
began to refer to the relatively new couple-dance rather than to the
Renaissance-Baroque processional dance that so often appeared in Baroque
suites.
French dancing-masters were apparently familiar with the German coupledance early in the 18th century, for they included some ländler-like movements
in the Contredanse (see Feuillet’s Recueil de dances, 1705), although these
were modified to suit French taste (omitting, for example, the seemingly vulgar
and inelegant embrace). After about 1760, however, the independent German
Dance became popular; it was included in published dance manuals, The new,
socially accepted German Dance of the late 18th century consisted of a series
of ländler-like passes, ending with a tentative (not too close) embrace. Tunes
were at first in 2/4 or 3/8, the former being particularly characteristic of the
ländler type of German Dance. Guillaume described a duple-metre German
Dance that resembled the waltz, danced with a springing movement, and a
triple-metre version, sometimes called the boiteuse (‘limping’), that consisted
of a ‘step and hop’. The author failed to show exactly how the steps fit with
accompanying music but the movements he described fall most happily on the
first and third beats of a bar
Contredance

One of the attractions of the contredanse was that it allowed several couples to dance at
one time. The contredanse itself had various subcategories. The contredanse anglaise,
often known simply as the ‘anglaise’, used a traditional English longways formation. The
contredanse française, which came to be called the ‘cotillon’, involved two or, more often,
four couples in a square formation. Both types generated huge amounts of material from
all over Europe, both printed and manuscript: dance notations with and without music,
verbal descriptions of figures, and collections of music (for a partial list, primarily of
French sources, see Guilcher, 1969; for illustration see Contredanse). Even though
contredanses of both types involved a limited range of steps compared with the court
dances, the sequence of figures could be quite complex. In his Trattato theorico-prattico
di ballo (Naples, 1779) the Italian dancer Gennaro Magri praised the French practice of
allowing at a ball only dancers who had memorized the steps and figures in advance; in
fact, he stated, the contredanse should not be done at all if there was any doubt that its
performance would not meet a high standard. Magri's own contredanses sometimes use
large groups of dancers; one, composed for a mascarade, calls for 32 people. Following
1760 the contredanse allemande (sometimes, confusingly, called simply the ‘allemande’)
swept Paris; according to La Cuisse (Répertoire des bals, 1765) it derived from the
exposure the French army had to German dancing during the Seven Years’ War. This
variation on the contredanse française added complex hand holds and passes under the
arm to the figures of the dance. A group performing a contredanse allemande may be
seen in the engraving Le bal paré (1774), by Duclos after Saint Aubin. (Behind-the-back
hand holds and hands on the hips may be seen as markers of a German character in
French dance as early as 1701.) In the last decade of the century yet another regional
variant, the écossaise, began to appear in ballrooms.
Dance through Time
This DVD shows the most influential social
dances of the French Baroque Court.
 The renowned Minuet is demonstrated with
step and floor pattern detail.
 The complicated handholds of the
Allemande are carefully delineated.
 The intricate patterns of the Contredance
are brought to life by eight dancers.

Dance Categories


Functional dance music, two overlapping categories:
theatrical and social.
Many of the courts in Europe cultivated some form of
danced entertainment, called variously ballet, masque,
ballo or intermedio, that involved both professional
dancers and courtiers. Depending on the nature of the
occasion and the means available, such spectacles could
be extremely elaborate, with huge numbers of performers,
elaborate sets and costumes, and even specially designed
stage machinery. The content was often allegorical, with
gods and heroes of ancient mythology standing in for
members of the court, but at the same time a work might
also contain comic or even burlesque elements.

Middle Ages and early
Renaissance
The Middle Ages

The key words saltare (saltatio), ballare (ballatio,
bal, ballo) and choreare (choreatio, chorea,
choreas ducere), as they were used by the church
Fathers in either a critical or an approving sense.
 The classical Latin definition of saltatio was
‘pantomime’, that is, representative dance in the
hands of professional performers. This became ‘to
jump’ or ‘to leap’ and, as the technical term
entered into the movement repertory of social
dancing.
The Middle Ages


The more formal danse (danza, tantz, hovetantz) for
couples or groups of three was, at least initially, the
particular property of the nobility.
The key words for the dance-technical execution are ‘to
walk’ (Middle High Ger. gên), ‘to step’, ‘to slide’, ‘to glide’
(Middle High Ger. slîfen); the embellishing schwantzen
(‘to strut’; literally, ‘to wag the tail’) is probably the
medieval ancestor of the 15th-century campeggiare
(Cornazano) and the pavoneggiare of the 16th century
(Caroso, Negri), just as these elegant processional
dances themselves stand at the beginning of an
uninterrupted series which leads on to the classical
Burgundian basse danse and the more elaborate Italian
bassadanza of the 15th century, and then to the pavan of
the high Renaissance.
The Middle Ages

The writings of medieval authors are full of
references to the musical instruments that provided
the accompaniment for dances.


Tambourin, drums and bells, pipe and tabor, frestels, lutes,
psalterion, gìgen (fiddles), organetto, bagpipes, shawms and
trumpets – in short, the entire palette of instrumental
colours, either singly or in a variety of combinations, could
be and was used to accompany dancing.
Estampie and danse royale, stantipes, ductia and nota,
saltarello and rotta, well documented in medieval musical
practice. From all this the forms of the instrumental dances
emerge clearly enough: short, repeated sections (puncta)
with ouvert and clos endings are the rule; their number can
vary from three to seven. There are some pairings of
saltarello and rotta which are early examples of the Tanz–
Nachtanz idea.
The early Renaissance

The culmination of the old tradition and the
beginning of an entirely new phase of dance history
came in the first half of the 15th century.


The dance, which previously had not been much more than
a loosely organized, companionable and entertaining, orally
transmitted choreographic activity, seems to have become
an art practically overnight, taught and written about by
experts who not only compiled the fashionable repertory
and developed methods of notation but also brought to their
subject a philosophical attitude and aesthetic insights which
went far beyond the merely pragmatic.
The Italian dancing-master was a respected member of his
home court, intimately involved with the private life and the
public image of his prince, a man of status, well paid and
much sought-after, teacher, performer, choreographer, writer
and master of ceremonies all in one.
The early Renaissance

For the Franco-Flemish

the basse danse,
 the stately, quietly gliding processional dance
that enjoyed the favour of court and town well
into the 16th century.
 Only five steps are used and these, having been
explained in the introduction, are written in
tablature: R stands for révérence, b for branle,
ss for two single steps, d for a double step, r for
reprise (sometimes replaced by c for congé).
These steps are combined into mesures of
The early Renaissance

Each basse danse

its own tune,
 notated in tenor fashion in uniform blackened
breves, each of which accommodates one step of
the tablature
 The rhythmic subdivision of the melodies lay in
the hands of the musicians, who would add
improvised upper voices to the tenor and create
the sonorities that the occasion called for, using
les instruments haults for outdoor dancing and
particularly splendid festivities, les instruments
bas for indoors and intimate gatherings
The early Renaissance

Italian bassadanza

The Italian masters delighted in the
invention of new shapes; figures alternate
with processional passages, linear
choreographies (alla fila) with others for
couples or groups of three; an entire,
newly developed range of dance-technical
possibilities came into play.
The early Renaissance

Italian bassadanza

Whether the pairing of bassadanza and
saltarello (Fr. pas de breban; Sp. alta danza)
is hard to say. Although combinations of a
slow, stepping dance with a lively, jumping
dance are present in the literature and the
music from the Middle Ages (tantzhoppaldei, baixa et alta) to the pavane–
tourdion and pavane–gaillarde pairs of the
16th century, the Italian dancing-masters
only rarely mentioned this sequence.
The early Renaissance

After 1500 the first traces of a new repertory




The branle became visible both in the musical sources
(Petrucci, Attaingnant, A. de Lalaing) and in the cheerful
dance instruction book
the characteristic dance of the common people, gay,
uncomplicated, frivolous at times; ‘and all those who take
part in the dance acquit themselves as best they can, each
according to his age, disposition and agility’ (Arbeau,
Orchésographie, 1588, trans. Beaumont, 113).
Tordiones, gallarda, l’antigailla gaya and pavana were all
mentioned in the university dancing-master’s book,
although he did not yet feel altogether secure with these
novelties
Not until 1560, when Lutio Compasso’s Ballo della gagliarda
was published in Florence, was the galliard’s prominence
asserted in the new dance repertory.
Late Renaissance

Before 1630.

From 1550 to about 1630 dance is well documented in
choreographic and musical sources, descriptions of court
spectacles, plays, memoirs, letters and iconography. These
rich resources reflect realistically the great popularity of
dance at that time as both a social and a theatrical art. The
historian is particularly fortunate in the nature and scope of
the four large published manuals on social dance from the
second half of the 16th century, a number which would
remain unequalled until the 18th century. Less fortunately,
there are still lacunae in the documentation of dance as
done by professional performers; despite many references,
for example, there is no precise choreographic information
on ‘antyck’ or grotesque dances, nor on the pantomimic or
acrobatic techniques of such travelling entertainers as the
commedia dell’arte.
Late Renaissance

Dance music of this period is not important solely as
accompaniment to the dances themselves. The specific
rhythmic patterns of the most popular dance types pervaded
much vocal and instrumental music that was not necessarily
intended for dance but was obviously meant to evoke it: in
music ranging from lighthearted villanellas, canzonettas,
scherzi musicali and ballettos to English falas and madrigals,
and from simple settings for instrumental ensemble to virtuoso
sets of solo variations, distinctive galliard, saltarello, canary
and corrente rhythms are found; evocative dance rhythms and
references appear also in more ambitious works (e.g.
Monteverdi’s Zefiro torno, constructed on the licentious
ciaccona bass, or Dowland’s pavan Lachrimae, or Seaven
Teares). These rhythms found their way also into popular music
still familiar today, like the national anthems of Britain and the
USA (clearly a galliard). Furthermore, dance appears to have
had a strong influence on the development of new forms and
styles of the late Renaissance (1550–1600).
Late Renaissance

The social dances performed at aristocratic
gatherings included such large group dances
as processional pavans, circular branles, or
progressive longways dances ‘for as many
as will’, but especially in southern Europe it
was the individually choreographed ballettos
(the direct descendants of the 15th-century
Italian balli) which dominated such events.
Ballettos were usually solo couple dances,
but trios (e.g. Caroso’s Allegrezze d’amore),
or groups of two or three couples dancing
Late Renaissance

Popular individual dance types which
appeared in both the dance manuals and the
musical collections were

the allemande (tedesca), branle (brawl, brando),
canary (canario), courante (corrente), galliard
(gagliarda), tourdion (tordiglione), volta (volte),
pavan (pavaniglia, paduana, passo e mezzo) and
saltarello.
 Some popular types, such as the bergamasca,
ciaccona and sarabande, are not in the
Renaissance manuals at all; perhaps they were
still seen as too crude for courtly ladies and
gentlemen.
Late Renaissance

The biggest difference of all between
manuals and musical collections is that
the typical paired dances of the musical
sources – pavan–galliard, passo e
mezzo–saltarello, or Tanz–Nachtanz
(Hupfauff, Proportz or tripla), which
continue the old duple–triple, slow–fast
combinations – seem to be largely
absent from the manuals.
Late Renaissance




The multi-movement ballettos of the Italian manuals
do, however, most often begin with these
combinations.
Most multi-movement ballettos are essentially
variation suites, although they begin with the slow–
fast, duple–triple combination;
Multi-movement danced suites may first have
inspired the grouping of dances into the multimovement musical suites which began to appear in
the first half of the 17th century.
Thus, knowledge of how to perform dances from the
manuals can give valuable insights into the relative
dance tempos in instrumental suites of the 16th and 17th
centuries.
Late Renaissance

One last point remains to be made about the significance of dance
music to late-Renaissance and later musical form: one of the givens at
this time was that in any dance the symmetry of the body was
paramount: whatever was danced beginning with the left foot (whether
short step patterns or long choreographic combinations of step
patterns) must be repeated beginning with the right. This mandate, of
course, required repeated (or virtually repeated) music of exactly the
same length, and it had to be clearly audible to the dancers (that is,
musically related to the left-footed passage) served by the musicians.
Whether in tiny internal repetitions, two-bar units, four-bar phrases or
larger combinations, the choreographies in the Italian manuals
particularly adhered to this ‘True Rule’ of symmetry, and the music
reinforced it (see Caroso). As Caroso explained it, the perfect piece of
music for dance was made up of multiples of two; indeed, it was a
semibreve made up of two minims – a binary time value – that was
now the ‘perfect beat’, rather than the ternary value of heretofore.
While such aesthetic symmetry to meet the demands of dance was not
entirely new (some 15th-century balli required it at times), the rigour of
its application now may well have led to a new regularity of musical
construction. Indeed, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that the
almost iron-clad Vierhebigkeit of 19th-century music may have derived
essentially from the needs of 16th-century dance.
Nido D’Amore

The Video explores the social and technical
intricacy of Renaissance dance. One dance,
Nido d'Amore, exposes the techniques for all
the major dance suites of the era. The refined
introduction (The Opening) explodes into
male virtuoso display (The Galliard), builds to
mutual ecstasy ( The Saltarello), and
culminates in a statement of strong
individualism (The Canary). This suite
mirrors the episodic changes of courtship.