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The Afro-American Transformation of European Set Dances and Dance Suites Author(S): John F The Afro-American Transformation of European Set Dances and Dance Suites Author(s): John F. Szwed and Morton Marks Source: Dance Research Journal, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Summer, 1988), pp. 29-36 Published by: University of Illinois Press on behalf of Congress on Research in Dance Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1478814 Accessed: 22/04/2010 04:28 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=illinois. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Congress on Research in Dance and University of Illinois Press are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Dance Research Journal. http://www.jstor.org THE AFRO-AMERICAN TRANSFORMATIONOF EUROPEAN SET DANCES AND DANCE SUITES1 John F Szwed and Morton Marks It is well acknowledgedthat the courtdances which developed in The chief problemin workingwith Afro-Americanfolk dances Europefrom the seventeenthcentury onward spread to the rural is theirlack of visualor writtendocumentation. As in anyfolk dance areas of Europeand to the new world.2 What has not been pro- tradition,these forms are passed down in an "oral"- i.e., body- perlyrecognized is thatthese dances - the quadrille,the cotillion, to-body - tradition.But there are additionalproblems, beyond the contradanceand the like - were takenup by Afro-Americans those of transformation,in the documentationof Afro-American in North and South America and the West Indies and were dances. Whiledance is frequentlymentioned in historical,travel, modifiedand adaptedto localcultural circumstances. In manycases and ethnographicliterature, it is treated briefly, quite often in - especiallyin the WestIndies - they continueto be found today. negative comparisonto Europeandancing. Yetas similaras these dances may look or sound, their functions And even where descriptionsexist, they are often minimaland are not always necessarily the same as those of their European confusing; a Europeandance name may referto an entirely dif- sources. At one extreme,they were "Africanized"for sacredpur- ferent dance; or a native New Worldterm may disguise a well- poses; at the other,they were re-formedand became the basis of knownEuropean form; and the Europeanname for a step maylabel a new world popularculture. An exampleof the formeroccurs on a complexdance in its own right.On the otherhand, descriptions the island of Montserrat.3 of the music for these dances are fuller,and the audio documen- Therecountry dance orchestras made up of variouscombinations tationis quiterich, especiallyas the recordingsof folkmusic in the of fife, fiddle, concertinaor accordion,triangle, and two drums WestIndies began well beforethat of the U.S., in the firstdecade known as the woowooand the babala(or babla)4play for social of the 1900s. dancing,but the same music is also used for inducingpossession This uneven documentationhas had the unfortunateresult of on other occasions, called "jombeedances'"5 On these latteroc- reinforcingWestern scholars' tendency to thinkof danceand music casions quadrille dance rhythms are intensified and gradually as separate.But in the Afro-Americantradition, they are thought 'Africanized"6in orderthat individuals may become possessed and of together,the steps and the music inextricablyintertwined - in convey the messages of the spirits. Secular customs such as theory, the same. It may be possible for dance scholarsto recover suppersfor guests aretransformed into ritualsacrifices for spirits, some of the dancefrom the music and musicaldescriptions alone, and the mundane lyrics of quadrille songs become part of the since in this tradition,the dance is embedded within the music. mechanism for possession. But the ritual occasion has become Forthis reason, we offerhere a capsuleview of Afro-Americanset "masked,"reinterpreted so extensivelythat the traditionalEuro- danceand dancesuites (that is, what in Euro-Americanterms might pean elements of the dance seem predominant to the casual be called "themusic for set dances and dance suites"),in orderto observer. encouragetheir recognitionand systematicstudy. On other WestIndian islands, dance suites and set dances are The Dance Suite in the Circum-Caribbean also associatedwith the spiritsof ancestors,as on Trinidad,where the reelis dancedprior to a wedding to ask for the ancestralspirits' The island of St. Luciais one of the best documentedNew World consent,and the quadrilledanced at a healingrite is associatedwith areas for the continuing presence of set dances such as the African ancestors;7 or on Carriacou, where libations may be quadrille,bele, and mazurka.10The quadrillewas probablyfirst in- poured for ancestorsduring a quadrilledance (reelengage); and on troducedthere in the early 1800'sby the French,or at least by the Tobago,where the spiritsare invokedduring the reeldance.8 (The English after they took control in 1814.Quadrilles - more than - Tobagoreel is performedmainly by people of Kongodescent and other adaptedEuropean dances requireconsiderable learning is said to be similarto the danseKongo of Haiti.) and rehearsal,both to dance and to play.The performanceof the The best exampleof the transformationof set dances and dance dances thus requiresa kind of planning and orderdifferent from suites into popularculture is theiruse in the creationof jazz in the other dances done on St. Lucia, and a system of values are at- United States,through the slow mutationof the quadrille/cotillion tached to quadrilleswhich contrastswith those associatedwith from music for social dancing to a purely abstractmusical form. other local dances. The St. Luciankwadril is understoodas essen- Sometimes,even wherethese dancesseem in otherrespects similar tiallyEuropean, as associatedwith economicand socialpower, as to theirEuropean antecedents, they at least differin setting, as on something inheritedfrom the plantocracywhich can now be par- St. Croixin the VirginIslands, where quadrilleis danced in the ticipated in and controlled. In this respect, kwadrilsare to local streets instead of indoors.9 dances what standardlanguages are to creole languages. DanceResearch Journal 20/1 (Summer1988) 29 ContemporarySt. Luciankwadrils are made up of five dances, of Jamaicanquadrille music are included on JohnCrow Say ... four of them strictlyprescribed, the fifth a round dance of choice. (Folkways4228), where the instrumentationis harmonica,wooden The orchestra,at least during the early 1900'swas composed of a trumpet and cassava grater;Black Music of TwoWorlds (Folkways violin, tambourineand chakchak(maracas), but is currentlymade 4602), a fife and drumband; and Bongo,Backra & Coollie:Jamaican up of violin, banjo,cuatro (a small ten-stringguitar), guitar, man- Roots,Vol. 2 (Folkways4232), where a fife, guitar,and banjo play dolin, and chakchak.No callersare used. Despite the dance'siden- most of the figuresof a set. (In earlieryears Jamaican bands might tificationwith Europe,St. Lucianshave made considerableadap- also be made up of combinationsof one to three fifes, two tam- tations.Kwadrils are more complex in structurethan the European bourines,big drum, grater,triangle, horse jawbone,and possibly quadrille,often have improvisedmelodies, are accompaniedby violins, accordionor concertina.At the end of the 19thcentury the percussioninstruments, use off-beatphrasing, and often involve most popularpart of the quadrillewas the fifthdance, an apparent- singing.1 ly local form, possibly similarto mento.19)The mentowas a local In Martiniqueand Guadeloupe formalEuropean dances such development,a looser,hotter form, with certainparallels to Trinida- as the mazurka,the waltz, and the polka exist in both ruraland dian calypso,but also having elements of Europeanand localfolk urbanareas, all of them having undergoneconsiderable creoliza- tunes withinit. Recordedexamples include Mento: Jamaican Calypsos tion in the last 100years or so. The quadrilleremains especially im- 1950(Ethnic Cassettes KA 5), a collectionof commercialrecordings; portantin Guadeloupe, where beneficialsocieties hold balakadri "MangoTime" on CaribbeanIsland Music (Nonesuch H-72047); (quadrilleballs) for fund raising and social activity.12Festival de "Wheeland Turn"on BlackMusic of TwoWorlds (Folkways 4602); Quadrille(Debs HDD 512)is a commercialrecording of such a folk "YouTell a Lie"on Fromthe GrassRoots of Jamaica; and TheRoots of quadrille from Guadeloupe.13 It documents two sets of four Reggae(Lyrichord LLST 7314). Jamaican quadrille and mentoare figures, the dance directionsprovided by a rhythmic,monotone directforerunners of skaand reggae,and echoes of
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