The Detroit, published in 1886, was a very simple sequence dance which in theory uses a polka variant, though the 6/8 music feels more like a two-step. The dance was choreographed by Herman A. Strassburg Jr. to music by John E. Fancher. The cover of the sheet music, courtesy of the Detroit Historical Society, is shown at left (click to enlarge).
The dance instructions were published with the sheet music as well as by M. B. Gilbert in his compilation Round Dancing (Portland, Maine, 1890) and by G. W. Lopp in La Danse (Paris, 1903). Both attributed it to Strassburg.
The dance instructions are essentially the same in all three sources, though the internal reference to polka variant is given by Strassburg as the Rush Polka, by Gilbert as the Glide Polka, and by Lopp as the polka coquette. According to Gilbert, and discussed here, all three are different names for the same variation. It's possible they are regional terms.
Here are the original instructions from the sheet music, again courtesy of the Detroit Historical Society (click to enlarge):
The reconstruction is straightforward and the dance is quite easy. The starting position is the "military" position, with the dancers side by side, the gentleman's arm around the lady's waist and her left hand on his shoulder, as described and shown here. The gentleman's instructions are given below; the lady dances on the opposite foot.
The Detroit (eight bars of 6/8)
1b Point left foot forward along line of dance, swaying backward, then back, swaying forward (1, 2)
1b Three running steps forward (left-right-left) (1..&2)
2b Repeat leading with the right foot
(take closed ballroom hold)
1b Slide-close-slide-close (1..& 2..&)
1b Slide-cut-leap (1..&2), making a half-turn
1b (Hop) slide-close-slide-close (..&1..&2..&)
1b Slide-cut-leap (1...&2), making a half-turn
(repeat from the beginning)
The last four bars are the Rush/Glide/Coquette, described in more detail here. The only real oddity is the 6/8 time, which means instead of a steady 1-and-2 rhythm (or 1-2-3, as Strassburg and others sometimes counted the polka), the first movement of most of the bars is slightly stretched out timewise. Technically, the steps are on 1...3, 4...6, though most people don't count to six repeatedly when dancing. This is actually rather nice on the polka steps (bars six and eight); the extra time for the slide alters the accent of the dance in a slight but delightful way.
The metronome timing given by both Gilbert and Lopp is 120 beats per minute; Strassburg just noted "Moderato". Here's a brief software-generated clip of the beginning of the music (four bars of introduction plus twice through the dance) at this rather leisurely tempo:
Interestingly, although Lopp placed the Detroit in his two-step/three-step section rather than as a polka, he listed it as danced either 6/8 or 2/4 time, suggesting that he was merely copying the dance instructions without having seen or heard the original music. This hint that Lopp was not aware of the original music for at least one (and probably many more) of the dances he collected is an interesting tidbit in an otherwise fairly generic dance. Gilbert, from whom Lopp copied liberally, listed the dance in 6/8 time and under "Miscellaneous dances". At the time Gilbert was collecting, two-step was not really a category of couple dance in the way it became a few years later. Strassburg, writing in the mid-1880s, would not have conceived of it as a two-step for the same reason.
Since The Detroit was written to go with a specific tune in 6/8 (or perhaps the tune was written to go with the dance), in the absence of musicians to play it, I would recommend using a different piece in 6/8 rather than 2/4.
The original sheet music, together with the dance instructions, is available at the Detroit Historical Society website.
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