katherine's blog

David and I performed a canary (rather hurriedly arranged, and improvised within our usual structure - no rehearsal) to begin Lochac's midwinter Coronation feast in the Hamilton Gardens on April 22nd. Sympkin, Elena and Katherine were good enough to play for us. To my delight Lowrens caught most of the performance on video (missing only the introduction and first mutanza).

Here it is on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqLkDHQogpM&feature=youtu.be

We did a short performance as guest artists at Viva Eclectika last year. There are some lovely photos on their website: vivaeclectika.org.nz/

Here's us:

• Katherine and David
• Patrick, Edit and Nadia - here, and also here

We've been dancing Brando Gentile to a lovely recording ("In the Italian Manner: Dance in the Royal Courts of Europe c. 1600" by the Copenhagen Musicians). That recording gives the first section as a very danceable compound-duple (6/8 or 6/4).

Compasso's tenth mutanza scempio (simple variation, taking one measure) is this:

Ponta è calcagno in volta.

Toe and heel, turning around.

I've had trouble finding a way to do this that feels tidy and looks good. I've juat had a breakthrough on "feeling tidy and looking good", but I have some concerns about whether it's an accurate interpretation of the step.

I'm revisiting the Pavaniglia, and finding I have some new questions (and I'm returning to some old ones) about my reconstruction of the Pavaniglia from Il Ballarino in 2009:

The third verse, the retreating passeggio: those fioretti are fioretti a pie pari. I really want them to be 'normal' fioretti, done backwards, as I love the step and I love the symmetry with the second verse. But the text has fioretti a pie pari. Hmmm.

From Florio's Italian-English dictionary of 1611:

Brándo, a sword. Also a gad of steele. Also a french dance called a bransel or braule.

(also: Bránla, a french dance called a brensle.)

I've long been interested in Negri's dances called "brando", and long defeated by them.

The man's final mutanza in Caroso's passo e mezo (in Il Ballarino) calls for four "seguiti trangati in aria semidoppii". Alas, Caroso doesn't define any such step, and nor does anybody else (that I recall).

Working on the Paso e mezzo from Il Ballarino, noticed something in the text, and had a thought:

the first passeggio together (second and third strain of music) and the woman's passeggio have the same steps, but it's not an identical description - danced together, do you reverse direction after the seguito ordinario or do you continue clockwise?