Music
Music was traditionally provided by either a pipe and tabor or a fiddle. These are still used today, but the most common instrument is the melodeon. Accordions and concertinas are also common, and other instruments are sometimes used. Often drums are employed.
Cotswold and sword dancers are most often accompanied by a single player, but Northwest and Border sides often have a band, usually including a drum.
For Cotswold and (to a degree) Border dances, the tunes are traditional and specific: the name of the dance is often actually the name of the tune, and dances of the same name from different traditions will have slightly different tunes. For Northwest and sword dancing there is less often a specific tune for a dance: the players may use several tunes, and will often change tunes during a dance.
For dances which have set tunes, there is often a short song set to the tune. This is sung by the musician(s) or by the whole side as an introduction to the tune before the dance. The songs are usually rural in focus (i.e. related to agricultural practices or village life) and often bawdy or vulgar. Songs for some dances vary from side to side, and some sides omit songs altogether.
Several notable albums have been released, in particular the Morris On series, which consists of Morris On, Son of Morris On, Grandson of Morris On, Great Grandson of Morris On, Morris On the Road, and Mother of all Morris.
Read more about this topic: Morris Dance
Famous quotes containing the word music:
“Poetry is either something that lives like fire inside you—like music to the musician or Marxism to the Communist—or else it is nothing, an empty formalized bore around which pedants can endlessly drone their notes and explanations.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“If I could believe the Quakers banned music because church music is so damn bad, I should view them with approval.”
—Ezra Pound (1885–1972)
“As I define it, rock & roll is dead. The attitude isn’t dead, but the music is no longer vital. It doesn’t have the same meaning. The attitude, though, is still very much alive—and it still informs other kinds of music.”
—David Byrne (b. 1952)