The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #10702   Message #75844
Posted By: Bruce O.
05-May-99 - 03:27 PM
Thread Name: Playford, et al.
Subject: RE: Playford, et al.
Reprints of the Dancing Master tunes have been made to the best of my knowledge only by those interested in folk music and folk dances. The same goes for the histories of the tunes.
Facsimile reprint of 1st edition by Margaret Dean-Smith, 1957. This give a listing of all the know editions and supplements of all 3 volumes. The historical notes there (on tunes in the 1st edition) are drawn from a 3 part article by Evelyn K. Wells in JEFDSS, 1937-9, with additional notes by Anne Geddes Gilchrist in the 1939 issue (and from Wm. Chappell's PMOT) This is probably still the best single source of information on the histories of the tunes, but for the tunes used for broadside ballads these are superceeded by C. M. Simpson's 'The British Broadside Ballad and Its Music'. The histories of "Jamica", "Fain I would", and "Sedany" are on my website. I first published these in the 'Folk Music Journal' of the EFDSS. Anne G. Gilchrist also had an article on the history of "Red House/ Where Shall Our Goodman Lie/ John Peel" in JEFDSS, 1941.

Tunes also reprinted (in facsimile) in Michael Ravens's 'One Thousand English Country Dances', 1984.
All the tunes that appeared in volume 1 and its supplements, to the 18th edition, c 1725, are given in Jeremy Barlow's 'The Complete Country Dance Tunes from Playford's Dancing Master', 1985.

There are Playford dance groups that dance little but the dances in Playford's collections.

Music groups that have issued LP's of tunes from Playford's collections are Telemon Society (I have 3), Pywackett (I have 2), and Le Chant Du Monde (I have 1). Others are found among other tunes on country dance band/orchestra recordings, such as the Canterbury Country Orchestra.