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THE ROUND DANCES |
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quite slow. When I increase the tempo at .the urgent request of my young people, the old-timers all cry out against it and say it is not the schottische until I sometimes wonder if it is not their age rather than their memory that keeps the tempo so slow, and if perhaps the young people even in the old times did not always prefer, and usually get, a little speed.
We were delighted when the daughter of one of the pioneer women showed us how her mother used to dance the schottische over on the western slope of the Colorado Rockies back in the eighties. And since her dance is in three parts with each part repeated just as the music is arranged, I believe it to be the true form, and we have adopted it as our standard form of the schottische. We have since had several old-timers confirm it as the original form. It offers enough variety to be great fun to do.
The first part is exactly as described above in our first description of the dance. It is repeated once as the music is repeated. Then the second part changes for the second part of the music as follows: Still holding the same waist-shoulder position, the dancers take the two sets of little running steps just as in the first part, left-right-left swing, right-left-right-swing, but instead of closing together in the familiar dance position and hopping together around to the right, they completely let go of each other, and turning away from each other, each hops independently, the man hopping on his left foot and turning in a left-face direction, and the woman hopping on her right foot in a right-face direction. On the first hop they turn away and are back to back, on the second hop (on the other foot, of course) they turn together and are face to face, on the third hop they turn back to back again, and on the fourth hop they finish face to face, and continue on until they are side by side in the waist-shoulder position and are running forward again on the repetition of this second part of the dance.
The third part of the dance starts with the run exactly as the other two parts, but instead of the second half of the run, the partners let go of each other, and while doing the second part of the run, they turn completely away from each other in one position, making a complete revolution. As they turn back together they resume the waist-shoulder position and instead of hopping they rock forward and back on alternate feet. |
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