Pre-20th century dance music
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Folk dance music
Dance music includes various traditional dance music such as Irish traditional music, waltzes, rock and roll, country music and tangos. An example of traditional dance music in the United States is the old-time music played at square dances and contra dances. Brazilian dance music includes Samba, Pagode and Forró.
Historical dance music
While the combination of dance and music is very ancient (for example Ancient Greek vases sometimes show dancers accompanied by musicians) the earliest Western dance music that we can still play with a degree of certainty are the surviving medieval dances such as caroles and the Estampie. The earliest of these surviving dances are almost as old as Western staff-based music notation.
In the Baroque period, the major dance styles were noble court dances (see Baroque dance). Examples of dances include the French courante, sarabande, minuet and gigue. Collections of dances were often collected together as dance suites.
In the Classical music era, the minuet was frequently used as a third movement in four-movement non-vocal works such as sonatas, string quartets, and symphonies, although in this context it would not accompany any dancing. The waltz also arose later in the Classical era, as the minuet evolved into the scherzo (literally, "joke"; a faster-paced minuet).
Both remained part of the Romantic music period, which also saw the rise of various other nationalistic dance forms like the barcarolle, mazurka, and polonaise. Also in the Romantic music era, the growth and development of ballet extended the composition of dance music to a new height. Frequently dance music was a part of Opera.
