Tag Archives: Mrs Elford

Stage Dances for Women and the Demie Cabriole

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There is another pas composé which appears in many of the stage dances for women, although Feuillet does not include it specifically in his step tables. This is how it is notated in the ‘Entrée pour une femme Dancée par Mlle Victoire au Ballet du Carnaval de Venise’, a forlane included in the 1704 collection of Pecour’s ‘Entrées de Ballet’ (plate 7):

Forlana 7 (2)

The first element of the step is the same as Feuillet’s jetté ‘en avant et le second emböetté derriere’ (Choregraphie, pl. 72).

Choregraphie Jettes 72 (2)

This particular jetté is the basis for Feuillet’s ‘demie cabriole en avant’, which he also calls a ‘jetté battu’ (Choregraphie, pl.84).

Cabrioles Feuillet 1 (2)

In the women’s dances, it is notated as a jetté, without the third line that denotes the cabriole movement, the beating together of the legs in the air.

The demie cabriole is one of the few theatrical steps to get a mention in Pierre Rameau’s Le Maître a danser of 1725, in his chapter XXXVI ‘Des Jettez, ou demies Cabrioles’ (the translation is by John Essex, from The Dancing-Master of 1728, p. 96)

‘They  [jettés] are yet made after another Manner which requires more Strength in the Spring, Quickness in the Rise, and Extension of the Legs, striking them one against the other, falling on the contrary Foot to that sunk upon, and then change their Names and are called half Capers: But as these are Steps for the Stage, and in this Treatise I undertook to teach the Manner of making Steps used in Ball Dancing, I shall not trouble my Reader with these latter, which are only for those whose Form is exquisitely nice, and who make Dancing their Business.’

We might assume that Rameau (as well as his translator) refers to male professional dancers, but he does not specifically say so.

So, where does this jetté ‘emböetté’ appear in the solos and duets for women within the three collections I am looking at? The other solo dance in the Pecour collection of 1704 which includes it is Mlle Subligny’s ‘Gigue pour une femme’, to music from Gatti’s Scylla, first in bar 22 (plate 43, shown below) and again in bar 34 (plate 44).

Gigue Angleterre 43 (2)

She starts with the right foot the first time and the left foot when the step reappears. Both times it is preceded by a pas de bourée emboîté and followed by a coupé battu. The step is embedded within a repeated 12-bar sequence of steps danced to the first and second repeats of the B section of the music.

It also occurs in the one duet in the 1704 collection, the forlane danced by Mlle Victoire and Mlle Dangeville in the Ballet des Fragments de Lully (bar 17, plate 53).

Forlana duet 53 (2)

Here, it is preceded by an assemblé / pas simple combination and followed by a coupé battu.

The jetté emboîté occurs in three of the women’s solos in Pecour’s Nouveau recüeil of around 1713. The first is the ‘Gigue pour une femme seul’ from Campra’s Tancrède (bar 18, plate 75), danced by Mlle Guyot.

Gigue Tancrede 75 (2)

Here, it follows a contretemps backwards and is followed by a coupé battu.

In the ‘Passacaille pour une femme’ danced by Mlle Subligny to music from Lully’s Armide it appears twice. First in bar 62 (plate 82, shown below left), where it is preceded by a pas de bourée and followed by a coupé battu, then in bar 74 (plate 83, shown below right), where it follows a pas de bourée emboîté. This second time, the concluding pas simple becomes a pas plié and the dance bar ends with a coupé avec rond de jambe.

Passacaille Armide 82 (2) Passacaille Armide 83 (2)

 

This proto-cabriole turns up in both the canary duets for women in this collection. In the ‘Canarÿe’ it occurs twice, first in bar 10 (plate 43, see below top), where it is preceded by a pas de bourée emboîté and followed by a coupé battu. The second time, in bar 38 (plate 45, see below bottom), it begins the final musical section after the assemblé / pas simple which finishes a pas de rigaudon and is followed by a coupé battu.

Canarye Guyot Prevost 43 (3)

Canarye Guyot Prevost 45 (2)

In the ‘Entrée de deux Bacchante’, like the ‘Canarÿe’ danced by Mlle Guyot and Mlle Prévost, it also begins the final musical section (bar 26, plate 63) and is preceded by a pas de bourée and followed by a coupé battu.

Bacchante Guyot Prevost 63 (2)

In his New Collection of around 1725, L’Abbé’s ‘Passagalia of Venüs & Adonis’ provides Mrs Santlow with several variants on the basic jetté emboîté which I will discuss in another post. In the ‘Passacaille of Armide’ danced by Mrs Elford and Mrs Santlow, this proto-cabriole comes in bar 100 (plate 13), immediately preceding the assemblé battu which closes the musical variation. It is preceded by a pas composé comprised of a coupé to first position, a pas plié and a jetté. And, as you see, there are three of these variant jettés emboîtés in the bar rather than the more usual two.

Passacaille Armide Duet 13 (3)

Like the pas de sissonne battu, this jetté emboîté is a commonplace in stage dances for women. Should we make anything of the fact that in the majority of the dances by Pecour it is followed by coupé battu? If nothing else, it seems to point to one of his favoured choreographic devices.

Why have I dealt with this topic at such length? Am I the only one who has danced all these choreographies to wonder whether the jetté emboîté should really be a demie cabriole? The female professional dancers for whom these dances were created undoubtedly had the strength and the technical skill to perform cabrioles, which would have been clearly seen under the shorter skirts we know they wore. Did the notations follow a convention related to the one that routinely depicts leading ballerinas in floor-length skirts? I believe they did.

 

Pas de Sissonne Battu in Stage Dances for Women

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The pas de sissonne battu, shown in Feuillet’s ‘Table des Pas de Sissonne’ turns up in several of the notated stage solos and duets for women. I am not going to attempt any detailed analysis in this post, I will simply point out where the step occurs.

It can be found in two of the choreographies in the 1704 collection of Pecour’s ‘Entrées de Ballet’: the ‘Passacaille pour une femme’ performed by Mlle Subligny in Gatti’s Scylla; and the ‘Entrée Espagnolle pour une femme’ danced by her in Campra’s L’Europe galante.

It is notated twice in the passacaille, first in bar 96 (plate 28), when it is not (strictly speaking) a pas de sissonne since the assemblé battu is followed by a changement, and the dance bar concludes with a coupé simple.

Passacaille Scylla 28 (2)

It is danced again in bar 152 (plate 31). In both cases, the step is preceded by a coupé soutenue and followed by a coupé battu avec ouverture de jambe.

In the ‘Entrée Espagnolle’ it comes in the penultimate bar of the dance, bar 29 (plate 40) – the loure is notated with two pas composés to each bar of the music. The pas de sissonne is preceded by a contretemps and has an ouverture de jambe on the concluding spring. The assemblé battu is performed with a half turn in the air.

Entree Espagnolle 40 (2)

In Pecour’s Nouveau recüeil of around 1713, the pas de sissonne battu turns up in four of the female solos and just one of the duets. The ‘Gigue pour une femme’ danced to music from Louis Lully’s and Marais’s Alcide is a highly embellished choreography. The unnamed danseuse has a wealth of steps incorporating pas battus, although only one is a pas de sissonne battu. It comes early in the dance, bar 11 (plate 69) and concludes with a changement. It is preceded by two unusual pas composés incorporating tortillé movements (only one is shown here) and followed by a pas de bourée.

Gigue Alcide 69 (2)

I have often wondered whether the anonymous female soloist was, in fact, Mlle Guyot who is the female star in this collection.

Mlle Guyot is named as the performer of the ‘Gigue pour une femme’ from Campra’s Tancrède. This lively little number has a pas de sissonne battu in bar 32 (plate 76), although again it has a concluding changement rather than a spring onto one foot. It is followed by a coupé simple and a coupé avec ouverture de jambe, recalling the sequence in the passacaille from Scylla.

Gigue Tancrede 76 (2)

The ‘Entrée pour une femme seul’, a gavotte from Lully’s Atys, also danced by Mlle Guyot, has a pas de sissonne battu in bar 22 (plate 78). It, too, has a changement instead of a spring and is followed by a pas de bourée battu.

Gavotte Atys 78 (2)

The choreographic masterpiece in this collection, so far as the dances for women are concerned, is the ‘Passacaille pour une femme dancée par Mlle. Subligny en Angleterre’, presumably during her visit to London in the winter of 1701-1702. The music is from Lully’s opera Armide.

Mlle Subligny performs two assemblés battus during the solo. The first comes in bar 101 (plate 84) as a new variation begins in the music. It is followed by a changement and a coupé simple.

Passacaille Armide 84 (2)

The second is in bar 147 (plate 86), as the solo draws to its conclusion, and is the step just before she begins her final retreat. Again, it is followed by a changement and a coupé simple.

Passacaille Armide 86 (2)

The collection of c1713 is notable for the five duets performed by Mlle Guyot and Mlle Prévost. These characterful choreographies are full of pas sautés, although only the ‘Canarÿe dancée … au triomphe de l’amour’ includes a pas de sissonne battu (bar 8, plate 43). This example has a half-turn in the air and is preceded by a contretemps and followed by a pas de bourée.

Canarye Guyot Prevost 43 (2)

In L’Abbé’s New Collection of Dances, published around 1725, neither of Mrs Santlow’s solos include a pas de sissonne battu. However, the ‘Passagalia of Venüs & Adonis’ is an astounding choreography, so far as our ideas of the conventions of female dance technique are concerned. I have performed it numerous times and written about in several different contexts. I hope to return to it later.

L’Abbé’s ‘Passacaille of Armide’ danced by Mrs Elford and Mrs Santlow has one assemblé battu in bar 101 (plate 13). It draws attention to itself not only because it marks the transition to a new musical variation but also because it is followed by two beats in which the dancers come to a dynamic stop – a moment of stillness in which energy continues to flow through their bodies as they wait to resume their dance.

Passacaille Armide Duet 13 (2)

I suggest that, given the number of examples in these collections, the assemblé battu, within the pas de sissonne battu (which is often in a variant concluding with a changement) or alone, was a step integral to the vocabulary of early 18th-century professional female dancers. If they regularly performed this step, what other jumped pas battus might they have performed? There are some hints in the notated female solos and duets and also in the male-female duets as well as the dances for men.

Dances on the London Stage: Blouzabella

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On 8 June 1703, the entr’acte entertainments at Lincoln’s Inn Fields included a duet by Prince and Mrs Elford entitled Blouzabella. The dance must have been at least moderately successful, because it was repeated on 11 June by (according to The London Stage) L’Abbé and Mrs Elford. Blouzabella was revived at Lincoln’s Inn Fields in 1703-1704, 1704-1705 and, for the last time, in 1711-1712 when it was given at Drury Lane. At each of these revivals it was danced by Prince, initially with Mrs Clark and finally with Mrs Bicknell.

The title of the dance suggests that it was a comic number. Blowzabella is the vulgar, ostentatious and shameless wife of the hero of Thomas Durfey’s The Famous History of the Rise and Fall of Massaniello, inspired by the Italian fisherman who in 1647 led a revolt against the rulers of Naples. Durfey’s play was first given at Drury Lane in May 1699. According to The London Stage, Massaniello was short-lived, although both it and the entr’acte dance it inspired may have enjoyed more performances than are recorded there.

There are some puzzles about this duet and its performers. We know all too little about Mrs Elford and her repertoire, except that the sparse surviving evidence suggests that she was an accomplished exponent of belle danse. She is generally advertised in serious dances and her one recorded choreography is a passacaille danced as a duet with the young Hester Santlow, probably in 1706 the year Mrs Elford left the stage. She seems an unlikely performer of a duet that draws on the antics of a low comedy character.

Mrs Elford regularly danced with Anthony L’Abbé, but the suggestion in The London Stage that they danced Blouzabella together is very likely to be wrong. The original advertisement for the performance says:

‘Also an Entertainment of several Dances by Monsieur Labbe, Mrs Elford, and others; particularly the Wedding Dance, and Blouzabella. The Medley Dance by Mr Prince and his Daughter. …’

The wording ‘and others’, together with Prince’s appearance on this bill as well as the one for 8 June, suggests that it was he and not L’Abbé who danced Blouzabella with Mrs Elford. As for Prince’s later partners, we know next to nothing about Mrs Clark and Mrs Bicknell was well-known as a comic actress as well as a dancer, although her range did not usually extend to low comedy.

Prince’s appearance in probably all of the known performances raises the possibility that he was the choreographer of Blouzabella. Who was Mr Prince? Was he the Joseph Prince who married Judith, the daughter of the dancing master Luke Channell, in 1678 and was in his mid-forties in the early 1700s? Or was he perhaps a son of Joseph Prince, who might then have been in his early twenties?

Any research into dances on the London stage must be undertaken with caution. Even well into the 18th century we cannot be entirely sure who danced these choreographies, where, when or with whom. Nor can we always be sure what sort of dances they were. Durfey’s Massaniello has several dance numbers, some of which were serious, so was Blouzabella not as comic a dance as its title might suggest?