Links to music pages in some dance instruction manuals and dance collections reproduced on the American Memory site
Last updated on 18 August 2007.
Main pages and search links:
It can be difficult to locate pages containing music in the volumes on this site, and it can be awkward maneuvering inside larger collections. Word searches on the bibliographical information pages seem to be reliable (search for "music"), and the Subject search page includes several entries for "Dance Music." Within individual documents, however, the page search window ("Turn to. . .") normally applies only to paginated leaves in the original. Pages appended to a volume and containing graphics of various kinds, including music, thus, can be easily missed. (In a few manuals, the page search window has apparently been programmed incorrectly, as well). When the page search is not functioning, one can move around within a file using the "recNum" value in the link. For example, the last page in volume 1 (of 3) in the anonymous collection "Plaisirs de l'Arquebuse" is http://rs6.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=musdi&fileName=096//musdi096.db&recNum=403&itemLink=r?ammem/musdibib:@field(NUMBER+@od1(musdi+096))&linkText=0," where recNum=403. For the last page of music (end of volume 3) the url is identical, except that recNum=685.
On a separate page I have provided links for some nineteenth-century manuals: Later dancelinks. Here I have begun work on links for some seventeenth and eighteenth-century manuals. This is a work in progress; I hope to cover all the manuals on the LOC site eventually, perhaps including individual music titles.
- [anonymous], "Plaisirs de l'Arquebuse" or [Contredanses; description des figures, plan des figures] (music for dances, not an instruction manual; in three volumes):
- bibliographical information
first page of the first dance
last page of volume 1 (several dances from the volume appear a second time after this)
first page of volume 2
first page of volume 3
last page of volume 3 (and the collection)
- Alexis Bacquoy-Guedon (volume 1 is a treatise, volume 2 is music):
-
bibliographical information
first page with music
last page of music
- Louis-Julien Clarchies, 15e.[-30e.] recueil des contre-danses et walzes (music for dances, not an instruction manual; these are issues of 45 pages each: "recueils 12-13, 16-17, 20, [an interpolated, unnumbered set,] 23, 25-26, and 28 bound together in reverse numerical order"):
-
bibliographical information
first dance [=title page of recueil 28]
volume 12, first dance
volume 13, first dance
volume 16, first dance
volume 17, first dance
volume 20, first dance
volume "between" 20 & 23, first dance ("petitte luce")
volume 23, first dance
volume 25, first dance
volume 26, first dance
volume 28, title page
- Raoul-Auger Feuillet, trans. John Essex, Recueil de contredances mises en chorˇgraphie. English (treatise followed by ten dances with descriptions and music):
-
bibliographical information
- La Cuisse, Le repertoire des bals ((music for dances, not an instruction manual; in three volumes):
-
bibliographical information
first title page for music
In volume 1, each dance requires four pages: music, explanation of figures, notated dance figures, and couplet. first page with music ("La Marquise")
table of contents for volume 1
In vol. 2 each dance is in the sequence: title page, description, notation, music. cover page, volume 2
title for music section, volume 2
first dance, volume 2
In volume 3, dances have the sequence of elements as in volume 2. title page, volume 3
table of contents, volume 3
first dance, volume 3
final page of volume 3
- Landrin, Receuil danglaise (collection of dances):
-
bibliographical information
last page with music
- Landrin, Potpourri francois des contre-danse ancienne tel quil se danse chez la Reine (collection of dances, not a treatise):
-
bibliographical information
title page for the first dance
final page (some blank pages follow)
- Henry Playford, Dancing Master, tenth edition [the original was John Playford, English Dancing Master] (collection of dances, not a treatise):
-
bibliographical information
title page
table of contents, first page
The page search window works correctly after this page (up to page 215 -- see below for the appended supplement). first page with music
After page 215 is a supplement called "The second part of the Dancing Master" Second part. NB: the "Turn to" window does not work correctly here - even though it shows the current page #, if you click on the button it will take you back to the 10th EDITION page, not the supplement page.
first page of the supplement's table of contents
first page of music in the supplement
last page of the supplement
- Henry Playford, The Dancing Master. . . "Vol. the 2d" (collection of dances). This is not an edition of the The Dancing Master, as the bibliographical information erroneously suggests. It is a separately published supplement.
-
bibliographical information
title page
first page of the table of contents
After this page, the page search window works correctly for the rest of the volume. first page of music
last page of music
- Kellom Tomlinson, The art of dancing explained by reading and figures (treatise with appended engravings showing dancers, notation, and music):
-
bibliographical information
first page of the engravings, many of them with music
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