Abstracts

Early dance research and performance: past, present and future

Barbara Sparti

1. Authenticity and Early Dance.

Authentic productions of early operas and plays.
The term "moresca" is used by Giullo caccini in 1608 to indicate "the type of sung, played and danced ballo".
Can 15th-century dances be authentically reconstructed? Can 19th-century ballets? What of style and modern cuts?
How can these be presented so they are meaningful today?
"Every production of early opera is a compromise... .However, it is now taken for granted that the integrity of the score will be respected..., that the vocal ranges and characters of the singers will be appropriate, and that the orchestral forces will at least take into account period instrument sounds and performing practice. Stage-direction and dances still lag behind in historical awareness [my emphasis] (which is not to be confused with historical accuracy)." (Frederick Hammond)
Exact reproductions or essence? Vitality & conviction.
Literal (authentic?) interpretations;
Authenticity in costume.

2. How representative of the dance of a particular period are the extant written choreographies?

dances in newly discovered manuscripts widen our horizons;
dancing-masters - -known and unknown - who taught and choreographed, but did not "publish";
dancing-schools and their programmes;
dance for spectacle;
An archival document includes an order for "four hands" of black German cloth for a costume, together with 180 hawk bells, for a performance of "mimes" given in Naples for Eleonora of Aragon's wedding in 1473. What sort of dance did the "mimes" of the black cloth do?
dances in dance-music;
traditional (folk) dances.

3. Are music and dance always related?

Does early dance music and/or choreography reflect the emotions, affects and characters in opera and spectacle?
Is the dance music in early Italian opera always typical "dance music"?
Do dances and music always go together rhythmically?
Which comes first, music or dance?

4. Dance History and its Sister Disciplines
(Musicology, Art History, Social and Cultural History, Dance Ethnology)

Other disciplines' interest in dance history. Our obligations to and awareness of this interest;
"Music doesn't have to be heard to have meaning. It can be written [as can a dance treatise] as a presentation manuscript, which gives the work legitimacy to both the donor and the patron." Hence the questions, What was the function of music/dance? How was it perceived? How was it transmitted? (A musicologist specialized in 17th-century Spain)
Early dance scholarship, as compared with that in other fields: training, level, new research;
The project for an interdisciplinary conference at the Berenson "Villa I Tatti" in Florence on Domenico da Piacenza - his times and art, "has encountered difficulty in finding, not social historians, musicologists, art and theatre historians, or iconographers, but dance historians who have engaged in new research in the last ten or fifteen years". (B. Sparti)
Are dance historians too hermetic? Should we be interacting more? Seeing dance in other contexts.

5. Early Dance Historiography in Research & Performance

How much do scholars (and performers) of Early Dance rely on inherited "truths", viewpoints, interpretations?
Does the considerable historiographical tradition of our young "art and science" [Guglielmo Ebreo] need re-examining?
Inherited views, such as the weighty historiographical tradition concerning Philip II - so difficult to throw off - must, instead, be questioned. Princes, like Philip, created their own images which continue to be more pervasive than any articles in musicological journals! Therefore, if music (and dance) were considered essential attributes for a King, can we say whether a particular monarch truly loved dancing, or are we left wondering if this interest is, instead, part of the image, the myth (nonetheless of historic significance). (Roundtable on Spanish 17th-century music - International Musicology Society conference, London, 1997.)
Deconstructing the old and finding new evidence and connections.

6. Advantages & disadvantages for the performer-scholar

How is the scholar helped or hindered by his/her experience with the actual "doing of" the choreographies.
Dance analysis.

7. Who should perform? Do we need standards?

Are performances giving uninitiated audiences and specialists from sister disciplines, as well as dance & dance history colleagues, the best and most authentic picture of the dances of a period?
Who should review these performances? According to Shirley Wynne, choreographer and specialist in baroque dance, only early dance scholars and performers can be (and must be) critics of early dance performances, inasmuch as neither music nor dance critics are qualified. However, she cautions, if something doesn't "work" in a performance (or you don't "like it"), you must ask yourself, why. [Analysing why something doesn't work, and asking oneself how would I do it, can be sobering - particularly when one has no answer, but may result in new ideas.]
Why do amateurs want to perform? Are there particular places which are more suitable for amateur performances? What repertoire is performed? Is live music used? What is given the most important place: a careful reconstruction? the music? costumes? What impact have these amateur performances on the field of early dance?
new themes for performance; experimentation?
can we interest modern dancers and choreographers and learn from each other?

Beyond the ballroom. Dance as theatre art in 15th century Europe

Hazel Dennison

This paper takes its impetus from the final paragraph of "Pattern, Imagery and Drama in the choreographic work of Domenico da Piacenza by Ingrid Brainard , Pesaro 1987. It will explore the validity and feasibility of using the dances of Domenico in the realisation of theatrical presentations of the time and is based on the interaction of research, practice and teaching.

Theatrical presentations known: Form .... Content .... Occasion
Dances mentioned in the above: Form.... Content.... Function
Dance Composition/Choreography: Constituent properties relevant to social dance / theatre dance
Choreography: Contingent properties needed to transform social dance into fine art
Matching dances in Domenico to specific theatrical presentations: Reinforcement of Domenico's skill as a choreographer
Specific analysis of two forms (Ballo and Bassa Danza) in dramatic context with possible demonstration.
Relevance of paper to notions of (a) Continuity (b) Change
Summary: Relevance of paper to present and future practices. Ongoing challenge of creation through 15th century dance to widen understanding of 15th C arts and society.

Continuity and Change within the two dance-treatises of Fabritio Caroso (1581-1600)

Michael Lutz

Continuity and Change as the title for this conference seems to demand more or less, that one should talk about some changes reflecting different periods during the history of dance. In this paper I will take a good look at the changes regarding a very short period of about forty years. At the end of the 16th century, we have the chance, that one dancing master (Fabritio Caroso) wrote two dance-treatises: Il Ballarino, printed in Venice in 1581 and Nobilta di Dame, printed in Venice in 1600 (21605, as Raccolta di varil balli, Rome 1630). Looking at a lot of articles about Caroso, one should have the impression, that it is still not clear, that Nobilta di Dame is not a re-edition of Il Ballarino. Even that Caroso in several cases composed a new choreography to the same music as in Ii Ballarino (i.e. continuity of the same steps, music, dance-types), there is no choreography which could be found in both treatises without having changed.

In his second treatise, after about forty years, that he was working as a dancing master, Caroso changed some basic aspects of his concept of composing dances. E.g., in Ii Ballarino he accepted, that the pair would end in a different position as at the beginning (e.g. in Alba Novella). In Nobilta di Dame he refers sometimes to those dances, where the dancers in 1l Ballarino ended in a different position whereas "now", in Nobilta di Dame, they would have to end in the same position.

In the theoretical part of Nobilta di Dame, Caroso added some more steps. But, analysing the choreographies, these steps are not to be found in the choreographies. So, he enlarged only the concept of the theory of renaissance dance but not the repertory of movements for the performance. This seems to be strange, but it shows, that for Caroso, dance was not necessarely the dance, which was performed, but yet the idea of "dance as a text", which would fit into the ideas of renaissance-thinking.

Until now, the scholars preferred to mention Nobilta di Dame because this treatise is more clear and Caroso talks much more about his thoughts on Renaissance-Dance than in Il Ballarino. I think, that we should more and more read word by word both treatises and analyse each dance for a better understanding of the ,,dance in transition" at the end of the 16th century. This is, what I will fix up one some more examples, using and presenting a new kind of demonstrating the structure of these dances.

The effectiveness of Beauchamp-Feuillet notation as a means of recording dance in the eighteenth century

Jennifer Thorp

This paper considers the development of a system of notation devised in the 1680s by Pierre Beauchamp and published in 1700 by Raoul-Auger Feuillet and its use as a means of recording dances for the stage and ballroom throughout the eighteenth century. Continuity is represented by the reissue of older dances either in the Beauchamp-Feuillet system or in the modified system published by Pierre Rameau in 1725, their enduring popularity until the l760s, and the survival of what is recognisably Beauchamp-Feuillet notation until at least the 1780s. Change is indicated by the need felt by several dancing-masters, including Feuillet himself in France, and P. Sins and F. le Roussau in England, to modify the symbols or introduce new ones, and by the difficulties clearly experienced by all notators to record steps of an unorthodox, grotesque or comic nature, or to adapt the system to changing choreographic conventions, culminating in Auguste Ferrere 's adoption in the second half of the century of completely new symbols, the exact meaning of which not always clear but which he grafted on to the old notation system, and Malpied's verbal descriptions of certain steps (in the minuet for instance) which bear little resemblance to their notated form. The presentation will include demonstration of dances or sections of dances notated between the early 1700s and the 1780s.

One music - two dances

Helene Kázarová

There is one sarabande by Jean-Baptiste Lully, for which do exist two choreographic versions in the Feuillet notation. This is the sarabande from Ballet des Nations in Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme from 1670.

The subject of the paper is to compare these two solo choreographies edited by Feuillet in 1700 and 1704. Each one is worked out in a different mood and presented by a different type of a dancer. Through the comparison one can get an impact of the choreographic work of Louis Pécour and of the versatility of options in interpretating it.

The object is to show, how the students of the baroque dance can develop their own style based on the Feuillet notation, study of iconography and verbal description, and how the comparison of these two dances can help us to be more sensitive to the structure of the baroque music. The melody continues but ther dance changes and through the different structure of the choreographic text we perceive the same tune also in an other way.

Queen Anne's dancing master

Madeleine Inglehearn

This is a title given to Mr. Isaac by John Essex in 1728 and passed down through generations of dance historians to the present day. But how true is it? Evidence from the acounts of the royal household and other court documents suggest that this title rightly belongs to the Frenchman Jeremy Gohory, who has been sadly overlooked by history.

I would like, in this paper to present the case for Gohory and, perhaps, to reinstate him to his rightful place in dance history.

A continuing tradition? Manifestations of the grotesque in Purcell and Handel

Sarah McCleave

In his An Essay Towards an History of Dancing (1712), John Weaver described the grotesque or historical style, as 'representing by Action what was before sung or express'd in Words.' He advised that 'the Master must take peculiar Care to contrive his steps, and adapt his Actions, and humour, to the Characters or Sentiments he would represent or express.' Josias Priest, who had worked with Purcell, is singled out for his particular skill at this type of dance.

This paper will consider the contexts in which both Purcell and Handel used grotesque dance, isolating musical features which characterize their writing in this style. Weaver's subdivision of the grotesque into dances depicting characters and dances depicting sentiments will also be taken into account - what techniques and rhythmic approaches did Purcell and Handel employ in characteristic dances, and what 'hints' (both textual and musical) can we use to distinguish 'sentimental' dances from non expressive, 'genteel' dances?

"Strange and fantastic motions" A discussion of the representation of witches and furies in theatre dance.

Anne Daye

Witches and furies have been stock characters in the dance theatre from the Renaissance to the present day, with examples occurring in the masque, ballet de cour, ballet d'action, classical ballet and modern dance. Frequently conflated as characters, they also occur as distinct entities. Common views about their movement characteristics, music and costume are apparent across time, as also are revealing variants on the theme.

This presentation will focus on the seventeenth and eighteen exemplars, with illuminating cross-references to earlier and later manifestations, drawing on the music, literary and iconographical sources.

The close study of one character type will lead to discussion of the changing role of the grotesque dancer across time.

The missing link

D R Wilson

It is important to remain aware of the large areas of Historical Dance of which we are actually ignorant. I argue that one such area is of a European tradition of vernacular figured dance, which remains totally invisible apart from its inferred influence on the known dances of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

As a case-study I take the old chestnut of the movimenti in 'Parsons Farewell'. What is the connexion between English Country Dance of the l6th-l7th century and the compositions of Domenico and others in 15th-century Italy ? None is known, but my suggestion is that both derive certain elements (including the use of movimenti) from the un recorded European vernacular dance tradition. This cannot be proved, but is (to my mind) as good an explanation as any.

On Common Ground 2: Continuity and Change