United States or Taiwan ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The music, like the step, is that of the Mazourka. The couples are arranged as in the ordinary quadrille. Each couple does the petit tour forwards, and backwards, still using the second step, and repeating it three times to the right then resting a bar; three times to the left then resting another bar; which occupies eight bars of the music. These figures may be considered as preliminary.
The difficulty with young teachers in general is that they try to teach too much at once, like the young minister who preached all he knew in his first sermon. Never introduce more than two principles in any one lesson, and as a rule but one." "Is a mazourka as bad as a polka?" "No. I think it is not morally so bad as a polka: it has somewhat the grace of the waltz."
Count three in each bar. Time much the same as in Polka Mazourka. The music is generally divided into parts of sixteen bars each. The steps for the gentleman is as follows in the first part: Lady, as usual, begins with her right foot, doing the same step. Second step in second part. 1st bar. Gentleman, beginning with his left foot, does one polka step to the left, turning partner. 2nd bar.
Side couples do likewise. Finale. But if there are more than eight in the quadrille, the music must be continued until all have regained their places. N.B. Music continues during rest. The step of this dance is, as its implies, a mixture of the steps of the Polka and the Mazourka.
On entering the vast salle at such a moment the effect is scarcely imaginable, the gorgeousness of the immense theater, the glitter of the lights, the brilliancy and variety of the costumes, the enlivening strains of music, the mirth of the browd, and, above all, the the untiring velocity with which the dancers whirl themselves through the mazes of the waltz, polka and mazourka, present an appearance of bewindering gayety not to be described.
Then, too, we cannot make the piano speak without very careful use of the pedals." The Mazourka of Liszt was recommended as one of the most delightful of his lighter pieces. The Waldesrauschen also, was termed charming, an excellent concert number. "Begin the first figure somewhat louder and slightly slower, then increase the movement and subdue the tone.
After a mazourka comes a waltz, and Cecil is made supremely happy. "How utterly bewitching they look!" says a low, melodious voice at Floyd Grandon's side. "How tall Cecil has grown in a year!" "A year!" he repeats. Yes, it is a year ago that his old life ended, and how much has been crowded in that brief while. "You are a wise man," madame says, in an indescribable tone.
Where such women reign as sovereigns, what feverish words, what hopes, what despair, what entrancing fascinations must occur in the mazes of the Mazourka; the Mazourka, whose every cadence vibrates in the ear of the Polish lady as the echo of a vanished passion, or the whisper of a tender declaration.
This passage is suddenly interrupted by a SCENE CHAMPETRE, a MAZOURKA in the style of an Idyl, full of the perfume of lavender and sweet marjoram; but which, far from effacing the memory of the profound sorrow which had before been awakened, only augments, by its ironical and bitter contrast, our emotions of pain to such a degree, that we feel almost solaced when the first phrase returns; and, free from the disturbing contradiction of a naive, simple, and inglorious happiness, we may again sympathize with the noble and imposing woe of a high, yet fatal struggle.
But there was little spirit for the old merriments: there were no more carpet-dances at the Bareauds', no masquerades at the Madrillons', no picnics in the woods nor excursions on the river; and no more did light feet bear light hearts through the "mazes of the intricate schottische, the subtle mazourka, or the stately quadrille," as Will Cummings remarked in the Journal.
Word Of The Day