Bitte mand i knibe (Little man in a fix) |
| Niels Mejlhede Jensen, Bøgeløvsvej 4, 2830 Virum, Denmark. e-mail (web master) |
CONTENTS: (remember: you can use Ctrl Home in usual browsers to get to the top of this page, to the links here)
Photo of this week: The folk music band and dancers "Spillemandsdansen"
(="Fiddlers' Dance") are here playing and dancing in its home town Lyngby
in the northern part of Copenhagen metropolis. Lyngby (= "Heather Town")
here is called the King's Lyngby because there are several other small
towns with the name Lyngby in Denmark We are dancing on a lawn in front
of the old water mill, and on a small hill in the background we see the
church. The dance here at this place is part of promoting our interest
to the general public, by encouraging bypassing people to join in for a
simple dance or two.
Spillemandsdansen celebrates its 20 years' anniversary this week, 20
years of open house every tuesday night in a nice ballroom at the Technical
University of Denmark. Nobody pays, nobody is paid. The room is free of
charge as long as we buy our coffee and soft water at the café in
charge of the ballroom, and as long as we move out to another less convenient
place the very few times the ballroom is needed for better customers. We
have 20 years' anniversaries in many folk music groups at this time. Because
a new fresh movement in folk music and folk dancing started all over in
the Copenhagen area and in other places 20 years ago, as an alternative
to the traditional and more formal folk dancing associations. New people
with not the hereditary traditions and not confined by these traditions
suddenly found interest in merry folk dancing and the simple music with
its special style. With no dogmatic rules new dances and new music like
the gånglåt (see week 4) could be included. My parents came
all the way over here to Copenhagen to dance in my group one tuesday evening.
After a splendid evening my father said that Spillemandsdansen was just
the right continuation of the 170 years' family tradition. This is true
when considering the frame basis: involvement of interest, not for money,
and merrily dancing, more than emphasis on detailed correct dancing. But
there is a difference: in my childhood in Northern Jutland the dances (in
the last few declining groups) were characterized by the local tradition
with only dances from other parts of the country gradually getting in.
In the new groups in Copenhagen (without a folk dancing tradition) dances
from the whole country were of equal interest. I hope that the many 20
years' anniversaries will show also to lead to 25 years' celebrations.
Dance of the week, 1999, February 8:
| 1 | melody | the traditional good dancing melody, polished through generations of use on the fiddle | |
| . | chord
text |
Midi metronome = 160 | simple (folk music) chords, natural for playing the accordion;
these chords are used to make the other parts or voices in triad harmony; there should be no tension from dissonance anywhere including in octavo |
| 2 | A | (Above), parallel part nearest above in third or little more above | |
| 3 | B | (Below), parallel part nearest below in third or little more below | |
| 4 | ns | simple n part (see 6); often with the tonic feeling and often with the basic dance rhythm ("motor part") | |
| 5 | C1 | C parts are made from A and B parts, and so they are two parts to the melody | |
| 6 | n1 | less constricted part, and tones from the melody are freely included | |
| 7 | blank | . | blank staff for making your own part according to the principles here |
(The midi music is not repeated, except for 1' and 2' voltas).
Use also octavo, up and down.
Where wanted, notes can be changed according to the principles (use
a colour pencil), e.g. to improve the B part with some notes from
A.
The music is aimed at dancing, so part of the orchestra can be the
underlying "motor" when another instrument group is playing its "solo"
part (improvisation) as one of the many repetitions.
The double bass may play its usual notes, because of its low pitch.
It is better to choose a more simple part and play it well.
Music for dancing: the dance has running steps in the
first part, a part (= page 1), and waltz in the last part, b part
(= page 2).
This should be reflected in the music, and there is a distinct difference
in the melody from a to b. The simple ns voice is therefore made so that
you should play with slur from beat 1 to beat 2 on page 2, and so that
it is not possible to have this slur on page 1 (by having the first two
beats as two identical notes).
Accordion: beats per bar: 1+2
When I was young we always played this melody in Bb major (this dance was one of my mother's favourite). But this "new movement" in folk dancing that I joined 20 years ago over here in Copenhagen (see my story above on this page), had the melody in G and D major as this is much easier to play for the fiddlers (they want "Bb-absent" music). Such a difference from major Bb to major G gives a difference in timbre (from the violins specially) that is not always easy for me to fully like right away for an old traditional tune.
(c1, c2), (a1, a2), (b1, b2), (e1, e2), (f1, f2), (bass1, bass2)
When you click a link the music note sheet will (should) open as a new page on top of this main page, so that you can easily return to this main page. And you can easily open 2 windows of note pages to have both the left and right page in smaller windows, the right below the left.
(Help coming back from the note
sheet: CLICK note sheet to come back to this page, or just close note
window.
Remember: the note sheet opens in a new separate window, and that may
cover the whole screen. The back button in the tools bar does probably
not work because the window is new, with no history. All you see on the
page are notes because I have placed no link back here for not disturbing
easy submitting to the printer. Close the note window with a click at the
top or with Alt F4, or minimize or reduce the window, or ..., and you are
back to the main page that was there behind all the time).