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Susan de Guardiola, Social Dance Historian

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Category: Galop

  • Three Tiny Galop Variations

    Wrapping up my impromptu miniseries of posts on galop variations found in M. B. Gilbert’s Round Dancing (Portland, Maine, 1890) and G. W. Lopp’s La Danse (Paris, 1903), here’s a trio of galop variations which I don’t feel warrant sufficient time or analysis for individual posts:

    • Two of the three are short “do something, then some galop” sequences; the other is even shorter and rather dull
    • None of them are very challenging to perform, and two have repeated leaps from a complete stop, which, as a dancer, I don’t really enjoy.
    • None of them have any conflicts between sources.
    • One has a reconstruction problem, but it’s minor and easily resolved.
    • I fully expect that all of them have matching sheet music and that the names of the variations are actually the names of the tunes to which they were choreographed, but I haven’t been able to locate any of it, and none of them are sufficiently attractive to inspire me to spend much time searching.

    So, in the interest of efficiency, here’s the trio together with brief notes about each.

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  • Ripple, Ripple, Jersey

    The Ripple Galop and the Jersey are two galop variations found in both M. B. Gilbert’s Round Dancing (Portland, Maine, 1890) and George Washington Lopp’s La Danse (Paris, 1903), a French translation of Gilbert with some additions and changes.  Both variations use the late nineteenth-century American waltz-galop technique of a leap along the line of dance followed by a side step and a cut (or close of the feet) in the rhythm “1&2” rather than the slide-chassé of the galop, extending it into the “Newport” pattern of a leap along the line of dance followed by a series of side-closes, stretching the basic step-unit from one to two measures.  The key difference is where the side steps and closes fall relative to the strong beats of the music:

    galop:                  1 (side)                         & (close)    2 (side)
    waltz-galop:    1 (back/forward)    & (side)      2 (cut/close)

    The galop pattern ends in an open position.  The waltz-galop normally does as well, but it can also be ended elegantly at the end of the music by a close of the feet rather than a cut.  This alteration of the relationship of movements to music in dances of the “new waltz” family is what makes these variations interesting to me.

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  • Another Country Dance Gallopade

    • Era: 1830s, England

    This dance is one of a pair of country dance gallopades published in London dancing master J. S. Pollock's c1830 manual, A Companion to La Terpsichore Moderne (Second Edition).  They have no names or specific music, just numbers.  I've previously discussed the second one; now here's the first.  It's a very straightforward reconstruction.

    Here are the original instructions:

    No. 1.     (4 parts) 

        The whole of the party arranged in the same way as for a country dance stand facing the top of the room, and chassez croise all with partners — then facing your partners, all advance, retire, and back to back — first and second couples hands across and back again — first lady pass outside the ladies to the bottom of the dance, the first gent. at the same time going down outside of the gents. and turn partner with both hands, remaining at bottom.

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  • An 1830s Galop Pattern

    • Era: 1830s England

    This new and fashionable dance, which it appears is of Russian origin, was first introduced into this country at His Majesty’s ball, St. James Palace, on the 11th June, 1829, when the Princess Esterhazy, the Earl of Clanwilliam, the Duke of Devonshire, and some of the foreign ministers exerted themselves in teachings its novel movements to the company, and was danced alternately with Quadrilles and Waltzing during the whole of the evening.

    — J.S. Pollock, Companion to La Terpsichore Moderne (2nd ed), London, c1830

    In an earlier post, I described the basic galop of the mid- to late 19th century as a series of slides and “chasing” steps with half-turns interspersed, commonly found in the pattern of four-slide galops, performed as follows:

    2b    Slide-close-slide-close-slide-close-slide (half-turn) (count: 1 & 2 & 3 & turn)
    2b    Slide-close-slide-close-slide-close-slide (half-turn) (count: 1 & 2 & 3 & turn)

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  • Alternating the One- and Three-Slide Rackets

    • Era: 1880s into very early 1900s

    Combining the one-slide rackets and three-slide rackets previously described creates an interestingly varied dance which is referred to by the prominent late-nineteenth-century dancing master Melvin B. Gilbert simply as the Racket, with no further descriptor.  The unadorned term is used by other writers to refer to several different variations in both 2/4 and 3/4 time, however, leaving us with unwieldy labels such as Allen Dodworth’s “Alternating the One Slide and Three Slide to Galop.”

    Whatever one may call it, the sequence is not difficult once both the one-slide and three-slide rackets have been mastered.  Conceptually, one simply alternates two bars of one with two bars of the other to build an eight-bar sequence.  For the one-slide racket, two bars will be moving to the left and right (in whichever order); for the three-slide racket, two bars means moving either to the left or to the right.  So sequences may be built as follows:

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  • The Three-Slide Racket

    • Era: 1880s into very early 1900s

    The three-slide racket extends the two-bar repeat pattern of the one-slide racket previously described into a four-bar pattern which has a more galop-like feel and is somewhat easier to initiate.  It is described in the major dance late-nineteenth-century dance manuals of M.B. Gilbert and Allen Dodworth and in two minor compilation manuals, one of which (Cartier’s Practical Illustrated Waltz Instructor) names it “The Wave.”

    The instructions below are for the gentleman; the lady dances opposite.  The dancers start in a normal late-nineteenth-century ballroom hold with joined hands angled forward at a diagonal along the line of dance.  Like the one-slide racket, the three-slide racket follows a zig-zag track along the line of dance; there is no turning involved.

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  • The Galop Racket or One-Slide Racket

    • Era: 1880s into very early 1900s

    The galop racket or one-slide racket is the simplest of the various rackets and is described under  both names in different sources.  In one Parisian manual it is simply “La Raquette,” though most other sources agree that “the” racket is a compound sequence mixing two different racket rhythms.  Prominent New England dancing master M.B. Gilbert explained it simply as “Pas de Basque sidewise” in 2/4 time.

    The instructions below are for the gentleman; the lady dances opposite.  The dancers start in a normal late-nineteenth-century ballroom hold with joined hands angled forward at a diagonal along the line of dance.  The dance follows a zig-zag track along the line of dance; there is no turning involved.

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  • Introducing the racket

    The racket, or racquet, is one of the major new couple dances that began appearing in American dance manuals in the early 1880s and lingered into the beginning of the twentieth century.  It spread to France in the mid- to late 1890s.  I have found no information on its origins or reference to any creator.

    The racket is a lively dance that combines sideways slides and quick cuts of the feet back and forth.  It can be danced in both galop (2/4) and waltz (3/4) time, though galop time appears to be the default.  It was one of the few of the myriad couple dance variations of the last quarter of the nineteenth century to make it into manuals like Allen Dodworth’s Dancing and its Relation to Education and Social Life (New York, 1885, reprinted 1900), which for the most part included only the most commonly-found couple dances.  (He did include one of his own invention, the Knickerbocker, and the up-and-coming Boston.)

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Capering & Kickery

Susan de Guardiola, Social Dance Historian

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