Holly Berry

• Era: late 1850s onward

“Mrs. Henderson has introduced this dance in compliance with the request of pupils and friends, who were at a loss for a cheerful country dance in which all might join without previous instruction in the fashionable dances.”

Holly Berry is a short set dance apparently composed by London dance teacher Mrs. Nicholas Henderson in the 1850s.  Its first known appearance is in the second edition of her Etiquette for Dancing, published in the 1850s.  The dance was also included in Elias Howe's American dancing master and ball-room prompter, published in Boston in 1862, which appears on the Library of Congress website here.  Howe's manual, unusually, includes a specific credit to Mrs. Henderson.

The dance is reminiscent of the galopade country dances of the 1830s and was perhaps seen as too old-fashioned in style by the mid-19th century.  It does not appear to have been commonly reprinted and probably was not wildly popular.  But it makes an interesting change of pace in a Victorian or American Civil War-era reenactment ballroom.

Music
Thirty-two bars repeated as many times as there are couples in set (four times through for four couples.)  The tune should be lively, suitable to a galop.  Enough introductory music for bows would be helpful.

Steps
Mrs. Henderson specified that the "forward and back" is done with a walking step while everything else is done with a galop step.  In practice, one alternates feet moving forward through the figures, which gives it the feel of a polka or old-fashioned chassé step.

Formation
Four-couple set formed longways, as in a country dance, with each person facing his or her partner.  Experimentation suggests that while this is in principle a dance for as many as will, in practice it is difficult to make it work with more than four couples.

Calls
4b    All forward and back in lines
4b    All cross over (pass right shoulders with partner, turn to the right to face in again)
8b    Every two couples right hands across and left hands back
4b    Lead couple (currently at top) take closed position and galop to bottom of the dance
4b    Lead couple right hands across with bottom couple while top two couples same
8b    Entire set takes closed position and galops in a counter-clockwise circle following the lead couple, using four-slide galops and ending back on original sides (see note below)

The lead couple will now be at the bottom of the dance; the next couple now leads off.  The dance continues until every couple has led off and is back in their original places.

Performance note
While there are several possible ways to perform the final full-set galop, the easiest in practice has turned out to be as a series of four-slide galops with three half-turns: 1-and-2-and-3-and-half-turn, 5-and-6-and-7-and half-turn, 1-and-2-and-3-and-half-turn, 5-and-6-and-7-and-8.  A final half-turn is omitted because the dancers need to be left on the proper sides to restart the dance.  The dancers should break apart on the final "7-and-8" in order to be at the proper distance to move forward and back toward each other without danger of collision when using natural-length steps.

Reconstruction notes
As stated above, the dance was not originally restricted to four couples, but two practical issues make me strongly recommend using only four:

1. The full-set galop-around is tricky to accomplish in time with a longer set.  While it is not required in the original instructions that the set get back into its original orientation, experimentation suggests that leaving the set at a different angle in the room creates confusion as to which way is the top and which sides the men and women ought to be on.  And if danced in a ballroom full of sets, having all the sets galop randomly around the room and end in different places is a recipe for disaster.
2. The figure in which "every two couples" perform right hands across/left hands back is difficult for dancers to orient to in a long set; there is no opportunity to take "hands four" from the top or otherwise figure out which couple to turn to.

The other major decision I had to make in this dance regards the timing of the figures.  Neither Mrs. Henderson nor Howe gives any official count of music after the first sixteen bars of the dance; the times stated above were my decision.  In a longer set, one could simply take more time to accomplish moves like the lead couple's galop down and the full-set galop.  But this puts quite a burden on the dancers to match their dancing to the musical phrase.  Thirty-two bars is also a typical tune length and so seems a practical length for the dance.   

Sources for Holly Berry
Henderson, Mrs. Nicholas.  Etiquette of the Ball-Room.  London, 1850s.

Howe, Elias.  American dancing master and ball-room prompter.  Boston, 1862.

Special thanks to the patient crew who tested all the variations in this dance for me: Emily, Jan, Al, Lynn, Alex, Franzo, Marc, and Keira!

Comments

[Michael Barraclough]

I knew that I had seen this dance before and finally I have found the source. The dance was published in a small booklet entitled "Three More Dances of the Yorkshire Dales, together with The Boosbeck traditional Long Sword Dance, 1st edition. Collected and described by L. M. Douglas. Pianoforte arrangement by Miss H. Milvain". It is not dated, but is believed to have been published in 1935.

The country dances in this book (or at least Holly Berry) were then reprinted in "Dances From The Yorkshire Dales". This is a small collection of Folk dances collected by Leta M. Douglas. Clear notation and dance instructions are provided for the following tunes: Meeting Six/Buttered Peas/Kendal Ghyll/The Holly Berry/ Turn Off Six/Brass Nuts/Huntsmans Chorus. This was first published in 1979 by The English Folk Dance and Song Society (ISBN: 0-85418-120-2).

The dances were ostensibly "collected". However, some care may be required as the dance published as The Square Eight (Buckden and Rathmell, both villages in Yorkshire) and republished in the Community Dance Manuals as The Yorkshire Square Eight, is rumoured to have been made up by Leta Douglas to represent typical square (quadrille) dances in the area.

The Holly Berry is said to come from Grassington (a picturesque village in Wharfedale, North Yorkshire) and is set to the tune My Love She's But A Lassie Yet. It is described as a 4 couple dance. The dance is similar to that reconstructed above, but there are some significant differences. Both A and B musics are 8 bars in length. Total dance is 40 bars.

A1 Lines forward and back, change with partner passing right shoulder.
A2 Repeat A1 back to places
B1 (in minor sets of 4) Star right and left
B2 Top couple slip (chassay) to the bottom (other couples moving up)[4 bars]
(in new minor sets) Star right [4 bars]
B3 Bottom (1st) couple (with crossed hands, followed by the others) cast right up to the top of the set and back down again.

Michael Barraclough

[Susan de Guardiola]

Michael:
Interesting, but I'm looking at mid-19th century dance, not modern folk dance traditions (which are fascinating, but not the purpose of this blog). A 1935 source is a source for 1935, not the mid-19th century. An 1835 source would be interesting and useful, given the obvious choreographic connections with that decade's dances.

I am amused that a dance probably choreographed by an internationally famous and sophisticated London dance teacher and author is perceived after 80 years of folk-processing to be from a village in North Yorkshire. It's a perfect illustration of the entire "country dances are from the country" misapprehension!