Castle Walk is a dance originated and made famous by Vernon and Irene Castle. The moniker was coined from the Castle's signature dance step styling, and their touring stage show of 1913 lead with this as their signature. [1] The Castle Walk became popular through its introduction into the Tango. "Castle Walk" is also a popular American song composed for Vernon and Irene Castle by James Reese Europe (1880–1919) and Ford Thompson Dabney (1883–1958).
It was first recorded in 1914, commissioned by the Castles to accompany and provide music for their social dancing programs, having been one of these resulting pieces. Though many dance accompaniments of the time are syncopated rhythms, Castle Walk in particular carries syncopation in half-measure. [1]
In this dance, the man (the leader) continually goes forward and the lady (the follower) backward. In order that the lady may be properly guided about the room, the man's arm encircles her right under her arm, while her left hand rests on the man's right arm. The position of the lady's right arm and the man's left arm is high, with their hands clasped, as portrayed in the illustration. [2]
The man starts forward with his left foot and the lady backward with her right, walking with gliding steps, keeping on the toes to one count of the music with each step. This is continued to the end of the room, where a large circle is begun, which is gradually made smaller and smaller, until it is ended by whirling completely around three times to corresponding counts of the music, ending with a dip. [2] The three whirls must be done rapidly to accomplish a complete revolution to one beat of the music. [2]
The Castle Walk may be varied by describing the figure eight or zig-zag instead of the large circle in the steps taken. [2]
Troy Kinney describes the Castle Walk as part of One-Step as follows: [3]
This is a walking step of direct advance and retreat, not used to move to the side. The couple are in closed position, the woman, therefore, stepping backward as the man steps forward, and vice versa. The advancing foot is planted in fourth position, the knee straight, the toe down so that the ball of the foot strikes the floor first. The walk presents an appearance of strutting, although the shoulders are held level, and the body firm; a sharp twist that punctuates each step is effected by means of pivoting on the supporting foot. The shoulder and hip movements that originally characterized the "trot" are no longer practiced in the dance.
The waltz, meaning "to roll or revolve") is a ballroom and folk dance, normally in triple, performed primarily in closed position.
The foxtrot is a smooth, progressive dance characterized by long, continuous flowing movements across the dance floor. It is danced to big band music. The dance is similar in its look to waltz, although the rhythm is in a 4
4 time signature instead of 3
4. Developed in the 1910s, the foxtrot reached its height of popularity in the 1930s and remains practiced today.
The schottische is a partnered country dance that apparently originated in Bohemia. It was popular in Victorian era ballrooms as a part of the Bohemian folk-dance craze and left its traces in folk music of countries such as Argentina, Finland, France, Italy, Norway ("reinlender"), Portugal and Brazil, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, Mexico, and the United States, among other nations. The schottische is considered by The Oxford Companion to Music to be a kind of slower polka, with continental-European origin.
Soviet ballroom dance was a category of ballroom dance competitions in the former Soviet Union. Competitions in Ballroom dancing in the USSR were held in three dance categories: Standard dances, Latin dances, and Soviet dances.
Vernon and Irene Castle were a husband-and-wife team of ballroom dancers and dance teachers who appeared on Broadway and in silent films in the early 20th century. They are credited with reviving the popularity of modern dancing. Castle was a stage name: Vernon was born William Vernon Blyth in England. Irene was born Irene Foote in the United States.
The closed change is a Pre-Bronze, or newcomer waltz figure, performed in closed position. Changes may start of the right foot or left foot, moving forward or backward. This makes four different types of closed changes. Combining two changes results in a box step. In right changes the man starts from the right foot, while in left ones the man starts from the left foot.
James Reese Europe was an American ragtime and early jazz bandleader, arranger, and composer. He was the leading figure on the African American music scene of New York City in the 1910s. Eubie Blake called him the "Martin Luther King of music".
The Walking Boston, sometimes designated the One Step Waltz, is a very simple dance in which many graceful figures may be introduced. It is done to the same music as the Hesitation Waltz and Dream Waltz.
The cha-cha-cha, is a dance of Cuban origin. It is danced to the music of the same name introduced by the Cuban composer and violinist Enrique Jorrin in the early 1950s. This rhythm was developed from the danzón-mambo. The name of the dance is an onomatopoeia derived from the shuffling sound of the dancers' feet when they dance two consecutive quick steps that characterize the dance.
The Virginia reel is a folk dance that dates from the 17th century. Though the reel may have its origins in Scottish country dance and the Highland reel, and perhaps have an even earlier origin from an Irish dance called the Rinnce Fada, it is generally considered to be an English country dance. The dance was most popular in America from 1830–1890.
The turkey trot was a dance made popular in the early 1900s. The Turkey Trot was done to fast ragtime music popular in the decade from 1900 to 1910 such as Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag. Driven largely by youth counterculture of the time, the turkey trot fad quickly fell out of favor as the foxtrot, a much more conservative dance step based on the waltz, rose to popularity in 1914.
The country/western two-step, often called the Texas two-step or simply the two-step, is a country/western dance usually danced to country music in common time. "Traditional [Texas] two-step developed, my theory goes, because it is suited to fiddle and guitar music played two-four time with a firm beat [found in country music]. One-two, one-two, slide-shuffle. The two-step is related to the polka, the Texas waltz, and the jitterbug.
The Texas two-step is the same step known to ballroom dancers as the international fox-trot. Except for the one-step, which is just that, most Texas dances are variations of a two-step, also called a half-step, which is simply a step-close-step. The Texas two-step is generally done with two long steps and a step-close-step to two-four time. Speeded up, it's a shuffle or double shuffle, but still a two-step.
The maxixe, occasionally known as the Brazilian tango, is a dance, with its accompanying music, that originated in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro in 1868, at about the same time as the tango was developing in neighbouring Argentina and Uruguay. It is a dance developed from Afro-Brazilian dances and from European dances.
Tap dance makes frequent use of syncopation. Tap dance choreographies typically start on the eighth beat, or between the eighth and the first count.
The One-Step was a ballroom dance popular in social dancing at the beginning of the 20th century.
Figures of Argentine tango are elements of Argentine tango.
Corta Jaca is a step from maxixe, as danced in European and North American ballrooms and as described by Vernon and Irene Castle in their 1914 book Modern Dancing.
Mazie King was an American dancer, singer, and vaudeville performer.
Ford Thompson Dabney was an American ragtime pianist, composer, songwriter, and acclaimed director of bands and orchestras for Broadway musical theater, revues, vaudeville, and early recordings. Additionally, for two years in Washington, from 1910 to 1912, he was proprietor of a theater that featured vaudeville, musical revues, and silent film. Dabney is best known as composer and lyricist of the 1910 song "That's Why They Call Me Shine," which for eleven point four decades, through 2023, has endured as a jazz standard. As of 2020, in the jazz genre, "Shine" has been recorded 646 times Dabney and one of his chief collaborators, James Reese Europe (1880–1919), were transitional figures in the prehistory of jazz that evolved from ragtime and blues — and grew into stride, boogie-woogie, and other next levels in jazz. Their 1914 composition, "Castle Walk" – recorded February 10, 1914, by Europe's Society Orchestra with Dabney at the piano – is one of the earliest recordings of jazz.