Monday 30 April 2012

Razorlight and Morris On!

Picture courtesy of English Folk Dance and Song Society  www.efdss.org


Queues at the Opera House box office this morning! News of sorts. Anyway Razorlight had sold out by 1030 - which will leave my daughter a tad disappointed and I'll need to come up with something else for her birthday present. She treks all over - Manchester, Sheffield, Derby - for gigs but when something happens in your own town... Buxton tickets for Buxton people! No, I don't think so - it's a slippery slope. However, should you find yourself with two spare tickets - please let me know.


Back to things Fringey. I'm very pleased to see that the Chapel-en-le-Frith Morris Dancers have entered this year. The day of dance  - July 18th - is free, it happens all over the town and it will be the only Fringe event that many people will see. I, for one, am not in the least bit sniffy when it comes to Morris dancing - you won't catch me making mock. I know that it is hard work and takes up a lot time in terms of practice and performance. We'll try to carry some specific news of the programme a bit nearer the time, but in recent years there have been dance teams from the North West, the Midlands and as far south as Kent bringing different styles of Morris.

I am indebted to Steve Roud's excellent book The English Year (Penguin, 2006) for most of the following information on the history of Morris dancing. There are several references to morris in Shakespeare but it seems to go back at least a century before with the earliest references being found in 1448.

The spelling of the word 'morris' varies but Roud concludes that "The etymological evidence seems to point quite conclusively to a connection with 'Moorish', but this only gets us part of the way." There is no clear evidence to show that the dance originated from North Africa or Spain, for example, or that it was thought to resemble Moorish dance in any way. What is clear is that Morris dancing is associated with Whitsun and in some way is a celebration of the arrival of summer. Roud provides a long quotation from Philip Stubbes, a Puritan reformer, who writing as long ago as 1583 shows that Morris dancing may have changed little in appearance and was regarded with some suspicion even then!

"Then every one of these his men, he investeth with his liveries of green, yellow or some other light wanton colour. And as though that were not gaudy enough, I should say, they bedeck themselves with scarfs, ribbons and laces, hanged all over with gold rings, precious stones, and other jewels; this done they tie about either leg twenty or forty bells, with rich handkerchiefs in their hands.... Then march this heathen company towards the church and churchyard, their pipers piping, their drummers thundering, their stumps dancing, their bells jingling, their handkerchiefs fluttering about their heads like mad men.."

On a quite separate note I see that today (January 30th) marks the 360th anniversary of the execution of King Charles I. An event marked with great solemnity by the Society of King Charles the Martyr. My editor advises that I should avoid further comment.


by Keith Savage - Published 30/01/2009

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