Mr. Wilson's Hornpipe ~ RSCDS
Mr. Wilson's Hornpipe ~ RSCDS is a Scottish Country Dance. It was devised by Thomas Wilson in 1816 and published in A Companion to the Ball Room, London. It was interpreted by RSCDS in 1951 and published in RSCDS Book 16. It is R8×32 3C/4C, a proper Triple Minor dance. R32.
In Treasures of Terpischore, Wilson, 1809, he published a danced called "Wilson's Hornpipe". In his A Companion to the Ball Room, 1816, he published "Mrs. Wilson's Hornpipe." I cannot find any dance of his called "Mr. Wilson's Hornpipe". "Mrs. Wilson's Hornpipe"'s figure is closest to the RSCDS version. Wilson writes:
SINGLE FIGURE Tune played straight thro
Set & change sides with 2d. Cu: & back again lead down the middle up again & right & left with the top Cu:
OR THUS Cast off 2 Cu: & back again swing with right hands round the 2d. Cu: & allemande
DOUBLE FIGURE Each strain repeated
Hey contrary sides Hey on your own sides lead down the middle up again lead thro the top Cu: set 3 across & set 3 in your places
OR THUS The 1st. Cu: cast off at the same time the 3d Cu: set & lead up then the 3d cast off & the 1st set & lead up to places. set & change places with the 2d. Cu: turn your partner set contrary corners hands 4 round at bottom & half poussette with the top Cu:
The music consists of 2 eight bar strains. The RSCDS figure matches the last figure (the OR THUS of the DOUBLE).
Wilson defines most of his figures in his An Analysis of Country Dancing, 3rd Edition. in this dance all the figures are pretty self-explanatory. The only two I shall reference are:
- half poussette, as the RSCDS's version of poussette is rather different from Wilson's. It may be found on page 14 and means: "top two couples join hands with partner, circle (as a couple), counter-clockwise, around the other couple returning to their original places."
- and set contrary corners defined on pages 44-46 "move to 1st corner and set, pass partner right moving to 2nd corner, set, return to places the easiest way". Wilson does not show the corners setting back.
The animation plays at 120 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. 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.
An online description of the dance may be found here.
The dance contains the following figures: hand turn (allemande), set, circle, cast, lead (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=MrWilsonsHornpipe-RSCDS
The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 1951 by RSCDS. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2024 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
This website is copyright © 2021,2022,2023,2024 by George W. Williams V
My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.