English Country Dance is a form of social folk dance which originated in Renaissance England, and was popular until the early 19th century in parts of Europe, the American colonies and the United States. It is the ancestor of several other folk dances, including contra and square dance. English country dance was revived in the early 20th century as a part of the larger English folk revival, and is practiced today primarily in North America and Britain. In Britain, this form is often referred to as "Playford", while "country dance" is applied to a range of English folk dances.
Read more about English Country Dance: Form, History, Influence, Some (modern) English Country Dance Terms
Famous quotes containing the words english, country and/or dance:
“In necessary things, unity; in disputed things, liberty; in all things, charity.”
—Variously Ascribed.
The formulation was used as a motto by the English Nonconformist clergyman Richard Baxter (1615-1691)
“The city sleeps and the country sleeps,
The living sleep for their time, the dead sleep for their time,
The old husband sleeps by his wife and the young husband sleeps by his wife;
And these tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them,
And such as it is to be of these more or less I am,
And of these one and all I weave the song of myself.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“When my old wife lived, upon
This day she was both pantler, butler, cook,
Both dame and servant, welcomed all, served all,
Would sing her song and dance her turn, now here
At upper end o’the table, now i’the middle,
On his shoulder, and his, her face afire
With labor, and the thing she took to quench it
She would to each one sip.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)