Capering & Kickery

I've been waiting for most of my life for another horse to win the Triple Crown, and, much to my chagrin, when it finally happened I was working and therefore missed seeing it live even on television, let alone indulging my secret hope to one day see such a thing in person.  Arrgh!

I will console myself by free-associating to a foxtrot variation: the Cavalry Charge!

The first thing to be aware of is that Edna Stuart Lee, in her Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916), calls the following sequence "The Pony Trot" and claims that it was the original foxtrot step:

1234    Four walking steps
1&2&  Four trots

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I’ve been looking for something amusing to wind up the centennial year of the foxtrot, and I found it in the November 17, 1914, issue of The Richmond Times-Dispatch: some fashion advice for the foxtrotting ladies in the store advertisement shown at left:

Fox-Trotting Without a Fox Trot Hat
is like joy riding on a steam roller.

How do I follow up a line like that?  I can only suggest reading the rest of the ad (click to enlarge) for more delightfully fulsome language.

For historical dancers, this is a reminder that during the 1910s, dancing in a hat at an afternoon thé dansant was perfectly proper, though judging by the advertisement, either not everyone agreed or not everyone succeeded in finding a suitable hat:

Earlier this year I talked about nine different variations from the handy little booklet Edna Stuart Lee's Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916) in two mini-series, starting here (three posts) and here (two posts).  My choice of sequences may have given the impression that Lee's collection was mostly odd little variations with (often) even odder names (Chaplin Trot, anyone?)  That's because I was skipping over the simplest sequences given by Lee, since I have encountered them elsewhere and written about them, or similar sequences, in earlier posts. 

Here, I'm going to give a quick rundown of eight very basic sequences that Lee included among her more unusual and/or unique ones so that it is clear that there was a certain basic repertoire overlapping what is found in many other sources.

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The Newburgh is a longer and more complicated foxtrot sequence taken from Edna Stuart Lee’s Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916).  Like her Left Glide, it changes the lead foot against the music, with same opportunities and issues previously discussed for that move.

As is typical, the gentleman starts on the left foot, moving forward, and the lady on the right foot, moving backward.  The steps below are the gentleman’s steps; reverse everything for the lady.  The numbers are beats, not measures.

The Newburgh
12345    five walking steps (left, right, left, right)
6            cross right over left (lady crosses left behind right)
7&8       two-step (left-right-left)

1            cross right over left
 (lady crosses left behind right)
2&3       two-step (left-right-left)
4            cross right over left (lady crosses left behind right)
5&6       two-step (left-right-left)
7            step side right

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Continuing on with my little celebration of the centennial year of the foxtrot:

I’ve discussed before how the two-step and sliding sequences similar to the four-slide galop of the nineteenth century were incorporated into the foxtrot in its earliest years.  Other than one 1919 variation from Charles Coll, the two-step sequences described were generally symmetrical, with even numbers of two-steps either in sequence or broken up by walking steps.  Slides were generally done in sets of four.

Here’s another pair of simple “glides” from Edna Stuart Lee’s Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916) that break that pattern with single two-steps and a set of three slides.  The “Right Glide” and “Left Glide” are very accessible variations for foxtrot beginners.

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Continuing my little foxtrot miniseries, here are two more very easy hesitation variations from Edna Stuart Lee’s Thirty Fox Trot Steps (New York, 1916).

The “Rock-a-Bye” is a single hesitation, as described for the one-step by Albert Newman in Dances of To-day (Philadelphia, 1914), but done twice at double speed with four walking steps as a preface.  What that actually means in practice:

1234    Four walking steps (starting left)
1&       Step forward left, rock back onto right foot
2&       Rock forward onto left, rock back onto right

These are the gentleman’s steps; the lady starts on the right foot and moves backward along line of dance.

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