Monday, March 08, 2004
There is the nice English (American only ?) expression "I will dance a jig" used in situations where something is very unlikely to happen, but one hopes that it becomes true. Some examples:
- I will dance a jig of joy when it becomes "do-able" on a desktop computer and simple scanner.
- If Saddam Hussein or Osama Bin Laden are actually found dead, I swear to God I will dance a jig to an entire album of the Dixie Chicks.
- The day I can load NetBSD on my Indy, use the keyboard, mouse, XL24 graphics, sound, and VINO port is the day I will dance a jig of joy.
- I will dance a jig in wellington boots the day that happens
Dictionaries aren't really helpful to get information about the jig. This is just one example of a quite useless entry (at least for my purposes).
The dance performance group Rapetipetam from Quebec, uses the word "giguer" (in french) as synonym for step dancing on Canadian music. I have no idea whether that usage is common in Quebec. In any case, you then get utterances such as "Au Québec on gigue surtout sur du reel (2/4), pas sur la « jig » (6/8). Mais la gigue c'est aussi le gigot, la gigue de veau, la fille aux grandes gigues, ou encore un instrument à corde du XIIIe siècle, etc. Faites votre choix.".
And you get totally confusing situations when a Canadian tune called Red river jig (mp3, 1.6 Mb) in English, Gigue de la Rivière Rouge in French, turns out to be a reel.
The words jig and gigue seem to exist already since ages, according to Streetswing.com.
Friday, March 05, 2004
The Centro Comunitário de Carcavelos announced in 2001 the event Danças Tradicionais Europeias. As you can see: "jig" and "chapelloise" are mentioned separately: São danças de pares, como é o caso da Valsa, mazurka, scottisch e bourrée, e danças de grupo como é o caso do an dro, jig, chapelloise e tarantellas. How nice to be multi-lingual ! I'm not sure whether or not they consider it two different dances.
This is also the case on the page describing the repertoire of the Italian Associazione Danzare la Pace.
In what I would call the Italian version of Folkroddels, I found: la chapelloise: ballo comunitario molto ballato in Francia, danzato in cerchio su musiche simili alla giga irlandese suonata a metà; , and also: la giga irlandese: irish jig, proveniente dall'Irlanda, da noi viene ballata come circolo circasso.
The German folk group Cassis proposes this tune for the gigue, which, interestingly, is not in 6/8, but in 4/4. I would rather dance a rondeau to it.
This source claims the jig to be at least from the 17th century. Bad news for the choreographer Jim Arkness.
In a discussion about variations in the Gay Gordons, a progressive version of the Gay Gordon is described by Otto Oberdan, which he encountered in Australia in the mid 70s, and which is close to our gigue (but 4 bars shorter near the end).
The Vitrifolk traditional dancing site cites from the book "La danse traditionnelle en France" written by Yves GUILCHER: LA CHAPELLOISE ou GIGUE. Contrairement à une légende tenace, ce mixer n'a pas été inventé à La Caheplle-des-Bois. Il s'agit d'un mixer suédois, appelé Aleman's marsj, lui aussi apporté en France dans les années 30. Il est ensuite enseigné, dans les années 70 à La Chapelle-des-Bois et, le titre ayant été oublié, est rebaptisé "La Chapelloise". La danse se répand sous cette nouvelle appellation, ou d'autres : la champenoise, la gigue, l'autre cercle circassien, le rock irlandais, etc... La vogue du bal folk l'exporte hors de nos frontière, où elle passe pour une invention française. Sauf en Angleterre, où le mixer suédois se voit naturalié comme "English gay gordons".
Thursday, March 04, 2004
The band bando dal giari proposes this CHAPPELLOISE "DE SAN MICHEL", a marsh with jig-feeling, comparable with The Athol Highlanders what is also often used to dance the gigue.
Now, I don't seem to be the first one that asked this question. Corina Oosterveen (see also) wrote a paper about the topic. Here is the abstract:"LA CHAPELLOISE or the ALEMAN´S MARSJ and his 13 names. With regard to the origin of the dance “La Chapelloise" (= a term used in Germany as well as in some parts of France) we find various references. According to the opinions, one finds useful examples, how the dances have spread and changed in the course of time within the Bal folk dance scene since the 1970s. The present article deals with the description of the root which this dance has taken. In doing so the reader finds out detailed information about the origin of the dance as well as the phenomenon of the "Bal-Folk"."
This author reports: The last dance they did was called All-American Promenade, except it was exactly the same dance as what SCA dance groups call the Gay Gordons, which is a dance I quite like.
Wednesday, March 03, 2004
The GAMMALDANSARNAS RIKSFÖRBUND categorises the dance as a "polka". But on the video, they dance it to (quick) marshes.
In Denmark, there is a dance called Gerdeby Walking Tune whose description is completely the same as the A.A.P. It is claimed to be danced slower than the A.A.P. It is introduced in Danish folk dancing in the middle of the 20th century.
These two sites refer the AAP to be choreographed by Jim Arkness: The home for country western dance and dancers and Dancing deep in the heart of Texas, both of them having a very detailed explanation. The hand position is different than the one used in our folk bals, but otherwise, there is no difference. The sites do not indicate to what type of music it is is danced.
In preparing an article for Dansroddels on why we dance in Flanders, France and Germany, the All Americal Promenade to a jig, rather than to a marsh, I wanted to find out whether blogging is a good mechanism.
