To repeat (or not to repeat)? Dance cues in Restoration English opera

Abstract

THE aim of this article is to examine a simple possibility pertaining to the performance of theatrical dance in opera in the Restoration theatre, namely that the existence of many of the dances and their accompanying music in 17th- and early 18th-century English operas is hidden in the context and score of the just-performed vocal numbers. The possibility that this could be the case in one or two specific instances has already been raised: Curtis Price made the suggestion that the dances marked in plays may well have been performed using textless repeats of songs just heard; 1 and I have made a similar case for a particular instance while discussing the music for Purcell's opera, The Fairy-Queen. 2 But here I would like to consider the evidence for the expansion of these cases into a more general convention. I will be examining only those about which some ambiguity exists; the cues and contexts of many of the opera dances are unproblematic, the (hardly surprising) norm being that where the dance is at all unusual, the play-text will provide extra detail such as ‘dance to antick music’, or some similar instruction.

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