Throughout the mid- and late 19th century, dancing masters had mixed quadrille figures and couple dances such as the waltz, polka, schottische, and galop into single figures or entire quadrilles. A popular variation on this idea was a “varieties” or medley quadrille in which each figure used a different kind of music and incorporated a different couple dance. Such a one is this Fancy Medley, published in Boston in 1893 in The Prompter’s Handbook by J.A. French. The three figures of the quadrille include a polka figure, a schottische figure, and a waltz figure. The original instructions may be seen here (page one) and here (page two). The individual figures are quite similar to some of French’s single-figure quadrilles, such as the Waltz Quadrille and Polka Quadrille discussed in earlier posts here (waltz) and here (polka) and bear a close family resemblance to other single-figure quadrilles of the era.
Author: Susan de Guardiola
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Regency & Victorian Dance Workshops, NYC (Sunday, December 7, 2008)
I will be teaching two dance workshops for The Elegant Arts Society in New York City this Sunday, December 7th. Logistical details are here.
The first (1:00-3:45pm) will focus on the dances of the Regency era (1810-1820), including steps and figures for country dances, French quadrilles, and the nine-person reel known as The Country Bumpkin. Specifically, we will look at a variety of step-sequences to use for L’Été (second figure of the French quadrille) and will enjoy a new Spanish Dance and the 1816 version of the classic Money Musk.
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Light Dragoon
- Era: 1850s-1860s America
“Light Dragoon” is an easy mid-19th century American country (contra) dance, one of a lengthy list of contra/country dances given in two manuals written by Elias Howe. In one of the two, it is cryptically labeled “Pinkerton;” possibly this is the name of the choreographer of the dance. It is performed in a longways set of any length, though four to six couples is easiest. All couples are “proper,” with the men standing to the left of their partners when all are facing the top of the room.
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A Polka Quadrille (1893)
By the end of the 19th century, many quadrilles were being published that didn’t follow the earlier form of having multiple separate figures. Although this short dance does have two distinct parts, they are treated as one long figure. The source of the dance is The Prompter’s Handbook by J.A. French, published in Boston in 1893. The original instructions may be seen here. There are significant similarities in the figures to the Waltz Quadrille from the same source, which I described in an earlier post, as well a a generic similarity to other one-figure quadrilles of the late 19th century, which typically involve a mix of very simple figures interspersed with the entire set dancing in couples (waltz, polka, galop, etc., depending on the type of quadrille).
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Advancing & Retiring Sequences for Regency-Era French Quadilles
For the fourth in my series of posts (previously: setting, crossing over, and chassez-dechassez) on the step-sequences usable for various Regency-era French quadrille figures, I’ve pulled together three easy sequences which may be used for the figure En avant et en arrière (advance and retire or, more colloquially, forward and back), in which some number of dancers move forward to the halfway point of the quadrille set and then backward to places. It is an extremely common figure; in the first set alone, it appears in multiple figures: L’Été, La Poule, La Trenise, La Pastourelle, and the many versions of the Finale figure which incorporate L’Été. The move is sometimes written simply as En avant deux (trois, quatre, etc.); the return backwards is implied unless otherwise specified.
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Crossing Over Sequences for Regency-Era French Quadrilles
As with setting, there are a number of different step sequences available for dancers to use in the Regency-era quadrille figure Traversez (cross over), in which a lady and the gentleman opposite her exchange places. Traversez appears most notably in L’Été, the second figure of the first set of French quadrilles, and in the many versions of the Finale figure which incorporate L’Été. Below I will give a sample of five of the easier step sequences that may be used to dance Traversez. This is not an exhaustive list of all the period sequences I have for this move, but it should suffice for most dancers.
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Eight Easy Setting Sequences for Regency-Era French Quadrilles
I rarely have the opportunity to teach a wide range of Regency-era setting sequences, but there are dozens of them extant and suitable for use in French quadrilles such as the first set. Using variant setting sequences when setting to one’s partner is one of three ways to jazz up the oft-danced first set (the other two being using more exotic sequences for the other figures and changing the figures themselves) as well as in other French quadrilles for the setting part of the omnipresent “Balancez et un tour de mains” (set and turn your partners) figure.
The following selection of eight four-bar setting sequences is drawn from two sources in particular: the Scottish manuscript Contre Danses à Paris 1818 and the useful Elements of the Art of Dancing by Alexander Strathy (Edinburgh, 1822). Curiously, the best sources for quadrille steps other than the actual French manuals come from Scotland — the Auld Alliance revived in dance!
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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. (Edited 10/17/25 to add: Despite its inclusion in Howe’s book, I’ve no real evidence of it being danced in America and would not include it at a specifically American-themed ball.)
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Wrestling with Belle Brandon
(Note: since this post was written, I’ve expanded my research on this figure and written a follow-up post, Revisiting Chassé Out, which discusses further sources and slightly alters my conclusion about the performance of the chassé out figure.)
Recently my English friend and fellow dance teacher/reconstructor Colin Hume asked on the English Country Dance mailing list for help on some American dances he plans to teach later this month at a festival. He posted his notes (the final version is now up here) and asked for advice, since he’s not a specialist on historical American dance. I do a lot with quadrilles (French, American, English, Spanish, etc.) so I pounced on the challenge of the 1858 set he proposed to use, the Belle Brandon Set. This five-figure quadrille is drawn from Howe’s Ball-Room Handbook (Boston, 1858) by Massachusetts dancing master and music publisher Elias Howe.
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Society of Dance History Scholars Conference, Saratoga Springs, NY (June 12-15, 2008)
I will be attending the annual conference of the Society of Dance History Scholars this weekend up in Saratoga Springs, New York. I am not presenting at the conference, but I hope to meet other scholars with an interest in social dance history and reconstruction and possibly involve myself in some of the working groups that match my interests (Reconstruction, Early Dance, and Popular/Social/Vernacular Dance).
This will be my first SDHS conference, and I don’t expect to know too many people there. I’d be very happy to meet anyone who reads this blog or hear from anyone I already know that you’re attending.
