Capers at Canterbury ~ Simons

Capers at Canterbury ~ Simons is an English Country Dance. It was devised by J. Power in 1822 and published in Select Collection of Dances, Waltzes, Quadrilles, &c. It was interpreted by A. Simons in 1970 and published in Kentish Hops. Originally a Triple Minor this version is a proper 3 Couple Longways dance. In this dance the couples are permuted by: 231. The minor set lasts 32 bars.

I have the book "Kentish Hops" published by Charles Learthart, and in it he has Simons saying in B2 1st and 3rd couples a right and left through and back (four changes). I am assuming this is just rights and lefts as the "right and left through" I know is gender specific and only works when one couple is improper. Colin Hume tells me that in the original leaflet the words are just "right and left".

Simons says to "set right and left" in A2, but I'm told if you set toward your partner, you'll be on the correct foot for the subsequent slipping

The tune was published by Power with the dance and the music was synthesized by Colin Hume.

The animation plays at 113 counts per minute normally, but the first time through the set the dance will often be slowed down so people can learn the moves more readily (no music plays during this slow set). Men are drawn as rectangles, women as ellipses. Each couple is drawn in its own color, however the border of each dancer indicates what role they currently play so the border color may change each time through the minor set.

The dance contains the following figures: set, lead, hands across, rights and lefts, cross go below, (and probably others).

If you find what you believe to be a mistake in this animation, please leave a comment on youtube explaining what you believe to be wrong. If I agree with you I shall do my best to fix it.

If you wish to link to this animation please see my comments on the perils of youtube. You may freely link to this page, of course, and that should have no problems, but use one of my redirects when linking to the youtube video itself:
https://www.upadouble.info/redirect.php?id=CapersAtCanterbury

The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 1970 by A. Simons. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2023 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.