Ballroom dance is a set of European partner dances, which are enjoyed both socially and competitively around the world, mostly because of its performance and entertainment aspects. Ballroom dancing is also widely enjoyed on stage, film, and television.
Regency dance is the term for historical dances of the period ranging roughly from 1790 to 1825. Some feel that the popular use of the term "Regency dance" is not technically correct, as the actual English Regency lasted only from 1811 until 1820. However, the term "Regency" has been used to refer to a much broader period than the historical Regency for a very long time, particularly in areas such as the history of art and architecture, literature, and clothing. This is because there are consistencies of style over this period which make having a single term useful.
A country dance is any of a very large number of social dances of a type that originated in the British Isles; it is the repeated execution of a predefined sequence of figures, carefully designed to fit a fixed length of music, performed by a group of people, usually in couples, in one or more sets. The figures involve interaction with your partner and/or with other dancers, usually with a progression so that you dance with everyone in your set. It is common in modern times to have a "caller" who teaches the dance and then calls the figures as you dance. Country dances are done in many different styles.
A square dance is a dance for four couples, or eight dancers in total, arranged in a square, with one couple on each side, facing the middle of the square. Square dances are part of a broad spectrum of dances known by various names: country dances, traditional dances, folk dances, barn dances, ceilidh dances, contra dances, Playford dances, etc. These dances appear in over 100 different formations, of which the Square and the Longways Set are by far the most popular formations.
Irish dance refers to a group of traditional dance forms that originate in Ireland, encompassing dancing both solo and in groups, and dancing for social, competitive, and performance purposes. Irish dance in its current form developed from various influences such as earlier native Irish dance, English country dancing and later possibly French quadrilles, as it became popular in Britain and Ireland during the 19th century. Dance was taught by "travelling dance masters" across Ireland in the 17th and 18th centuries, and separate dance forms developed according to regional practice and differing purposes. Irish dance became a significant part of Irish culture, particularly for Irish nationalist movements. From the early 20th century, a number of organisations promoted and codified the various forms of dance, creating competitive structures and standardised styles. Irish dancers who compete for competitive reasons dance in a dance style that is more modern than traditional Irish dance. It is mainly done solo, but there is some team dancing in groups of 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, 16 and even numbers onwards.
The polska is a family of music and dance forms shared by the Nordic countries: called polsk in Denmark, polka or polska in Estonia, polska in Sweden and Finland, and by several different names in Norway. Norwegian variants include pols, rundom, springleik, and springar. The polska is almost always seen as a partner dance in, although variants in 2
4 time, as well as in compound meters also exist.
The music of Martinique has a heritage which is intertwined with that of its sister island, Guadeloupe. Despite their small size, the islands have created a large popular music industry, which gained in international renown after the success of zouk music in the later 20th century. Zouk's popularity was particularly intense in France, where the genre became an important symbol of identity for Martinique and Guadeloupe. Zouk's origins are in the folk music of Martinique and Guadeloupe, especially Martinican chouval bwa, and Guadeloupan gwo ka. There's also notable influence of the pan-Caribbean calypso tradition and Haitian kompa.
Social dances are dances that have social functions and context. Social dances are intended for participation rather than performance. They are often danced merely to socialise and for entertainment, though they may have ceremonial, competitive and erotic functions.
The quadrille is a dance that was fashionable in late 18th- and 19th-century Europe and its colonies. The quadrille consists of a chain of four to six contredanses. Latterly the quadrille was frequently danced to a medley of opera melodies.
The can-can is a high-energy, physically demanding dance that became a popular music-hall dance in the 1840s, continuing in popularity in French cabaret to this day. Originally danced by couples, it is now traditionally associated with a chorus line of female dancers. The main features of the dance are the vigorous manipulation of skirts and petticoats, along with high kicks, splits, and cartwheels.
Irish set dancing, sometimes called "Irish sets", is a popular form of folk dancing in Ireland danced to Irish tunes in groups of eight or four dancers. It is also sometime named set dance, but this name refers more often to a kind of dance in Irish stepdance.
The music of the Virgin Islands reflects long-standing West Indian cultural ties to the island nations to the south, the islands' African heritage and European colonial history, as well as recent North American influences. Though the United States Virgin Islands and British Virgin Islands are politically separate, they maintain close cultural ties. From its neighbors, the Virgin Islands has imported various pan-Caribbean genres of music, including calypso music and soca music from Trinidad and reggae from Jamaica.
The cotillion is a social dance, popular in 18th-century Europe and North America. Originally for four couples in square formation, it was a courtly version of an English country dance, the forerunner of the quadrille and, in the United States, the square dance.
Ceremonial dancing has a very important place in the Indigenous cultures of Australia. They vary from place to place, but most ceremonies combine dance, song, rituals and often elaborate body decorations and costumes. The different body paintings indicate the type of ceremony being performed. They play an important role in marriage ceremonies, in the education of Indigenous children, as well as storytelling and oral history. The term corroboree is commonly used to refer to Australian Aboriginal dances, although this term has its origins among the people of the Sydney region. In some places, Aboriginal people perform corroborees for tourists. In the latter part of the 20th century the influence of Indigenous Australian dance traditions has been seen with the development of concert dance, with the Aboriginal Centre for the Performing Arts (ACPA) providing training in contemporary dance.
In French Caribbean culture, especially of the Lesser Antilles, the term kwadril is a Creole term referring to a folk dance derived from the quadrille.
Valentin le Désossé was the stage name of Jacques Renaudin, a French can-can dancer who was a star of the Moulin Rouge in the 1890s as the partner of Louise Weber, known as La Goulue.
Danish traditional music is the music genre that has its roots in pre-modern Denmark. In this period it was common for towns to have one or more town musicians who played at dances, processions and certain rituals. In the 17th and 18th centuries, professional music performances were monopolized by town musicians, who also traveled into the neighboring rural areas to perform. Urban music and dance styles, often from other parts of Europe, penetrated the countryside and almost eradicated earlier styles. This period also saw the introduction of the fiddle as the most important instrument and the abandonment of earlier chain dances in favor of pair dances. Until around 1900, traditional music was the common musical culture of Denmark, but with increasing urbanization and the spread of classical music it became marginalized to rural areas.
The crossroads dance was a type of social event popular in Ireland up to the mid-20th century, in which people would congregate at the large cleared space of a crossroads to dance. In contrast to the later ceili styles, crossroads dances were generally set dancing or solo dancing. Set dances were performed as quadrilles where two sets of two couples danced facing each other. Solo dances were performed by the locality's best dancers. The crossroads dance declined in popularity in the mid-20th century, due to rural depopulation, musical recordings, and pressure of the Catholic clergy which resulted in the Public Dance Halls Act of 1935 which restricted all dancing to licensed establishments. In the early 1930s, the wooden platforms at crossroads became the focus of standoffs and faction fights between Fianna Fáil and the Blueshirts, with some destroyed by arson.
The Powick Asylum Music consists of a number of sets of dance music – quadrilles and polkas – written by Edward Elgar during his time as bandmaster at the Worcester City and County Lunatic Asylum between 1879 and 1884. The music was not published, but the original manuscripts of instrumental parts are preserved in the collection of the Elgar Birthplace Museum.
Joseph Binns Hart was an English organist, and a compiler of dance music, particularly of the quadrille.
