Winding up my Lawn Tennis Quadrille mini-series (see here for the introduction and first figure and here for figures two and three), here are the final two figures.
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Figure Four: The Double Pastourelle
Music: A=8b, B=40b, played A+ (BA x4)
8b Introduction (not repeated)
4b Six (along top/bottom of set) forward and back
4b Two raise arms and side lady (on left) passes under; ladies cross to side gentlemen
4b Six (along sides of set) forward and back
4b Two raise arms and side lady (on left) passes under; ladies cross to head gentlemen
4b Six (along top/bottom of set) forward and back
4b Two raise arms and side lady (on left) passes under; ladies cross to side gentlemen
4b Six (along sides of set) forward and back
4b Two raise arms and side lady (on left) passes under; ladies return to original places
4b All four ladies forward and back
4b All four gentlemen forward and back
8b All forward and back to partners and turn by two hands
Repeat all of the above as written once more.
Repeat all of the above twice more with side couples leading.
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Figure four's is another name which is descriptive of the figure instead of tennis. It's an interesting variant of the classic La Pastourelle with the strong mixer element that is typical of most of the Lawn Tennis figures.
There are no ambiguities in the instructions. I have once again converted a "balance to partners" to "forward and back to partners" for clarity.
The "six forward and back" figures should be done straight along the axes of the set, not on the diagonal. The first six are the head couples with the lady to their left. After that, it gets complicated as the ladies progress; see the diagrams below. In dancing the figure, the trick to remember is that the gentleman always raises his right arm (which will be attached to either the first or second lady) and draws the lady on his left (which will be the third or fourth lady) to pass under the resulting arch. Head ladies should remember to always raise their left arms. Side ladies should remember that they always go under an arch. This figure works best if each gentleman remains facing into the center and draws both ladies in front of him, so the ladies are aimed directly across the set, giving them a straight track to their new positions.
I'll break down the four "sixes" for clarity.
First six:
L2 - G2 - L3
L4 - G1 - L1
(L3 and L4 pass under and the ladies all cross the set)
L3 L2
G4 G3
L1 L4
(L3 and L4 pass under again and the ladies all cross the set)
L1 - G2 - L4
L3 - G1 - L2
(L3 and L4 pass under again and the ladies all cross the set)
L4 L1
G4 G3
L2 L3
(L3 and L4 pass under again and all ladies cross to original places, side ladies curving around to their right to stand next to their partners)
When setting up to dance Lawn Tennis, it may be helpful for the couples with the tallest ladies to be head couples and those with the shortest ladies to be side couples.
Koncen once again messed things up, claiming that two gentlemen make the arch for a lady to pass under. That...doesn't work. He also called for this figure to be repeated only once, for the side couples to lead, rather than three more times, as in the original.
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Figure Five: The Net
Music: A=8b, B=24b, C=8b, Coda=9b, played [2b chord intro] + (ABC x4) + Coda
2b Introduction (not repeated)
4b All forward and back
4b Wheel into lines (see diagram below)
- third and fourth couple pass ladies to center, couple facing opposite directions
- first couple forward, leave gentleman in center of line facing his lady as she retires to place
- second couple forward on right oblique, leave lady at end of line facing her partner as he retires to place
4b First lady and second gentleman chassé-dechassé, sliding to the right and back to the left
4b All turn partners by two hands to places
4b All promenade half round
4b All turn partners by two hands
4b All turn corners by right hands
4b All turn partners by left hands
4b All promenade half round to places
4b All turn partners by two hands
Repeat entire figure with second gentleman and first lady moving into the line.
Repeat with sides leading, third gentleman and fourth lady moving into the line.
Repeat with sides leading, fourth gentleman and third lady moving into the line.
(Coda)
9b All salute
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The fifth and last figure carries a tennis-themed name and has six dancers simulate forming a net while two "play". It's cute, but, too me, it is actually not as interesting as figures two through four.
Here's how the "net" looks after the first wheel into lines. The "+" indicates which way each dancer is facing.
+ + +
L2 G4 L4 G1 L3 G3
+ + +
This is fairly intuitive in practice; the side gentlemen hold position on the side and bring their ladies toward the center, which swings the gentlemen to face the proper direction. The head couples are facing their partners.
The chassé-dechassé should be done as a simple four-slide galop back and forth rather than with the fancier steps of the early nineteenth century.
There are some quick changes of hand position in and of the first promenade. For the second one, the dancers already have left hands from the previous turn and can simply join right hands as well for the promenade, then shift quickly to two hands at the end for the final turn. Two-hand turns are not specified, but right- and left-hand turns are, so by default any unspecified turn would be with two hands. Koncen actually specifies the two-hand turn once, right after the first promenade. He also makes a mess of the net figure; he seems to think it's a Lancers, having the first couple face out and the others wheel into line. I'm guessing he saw a version of the instructions which only had the call "Wheel into line".
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This concludes the Lawn Tennis series. If anyone else dances this reconstruction, I'd be thrilled to receive a video link!
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