Marchioness of Blandford's Reel ~ Williams
Marchioness of Blandford's Reel ~ Williams is an English Country Dance. It was published by William Campbell in about 1795 in Campbell's 10th Book of New and Favorite Country Dances & Strathspey Reels, London. It was interpreted by George Williams in 2023. Originally a Triple Minor this version is a proper Duple Minor dance. The minor set lasts 32 bars.
Campbell writes:
1st. Cu set & change sides Back again — Lead down the middle up again to the top then 1st. & 2d. Cu hands across half round back again — Poussette quite round with the 2d. Cu hands 6 round Allemande.
Where does Campbell mean the progression to happen?
set & change sides Back again is not progressive.
What about Lead down the middle up again to the top? The "up again to top" does sound as if it returns the 1s to their original places. Yet if you look at Campbell's The new German Waltze (also in book 10) you will see him use those same words where that is the only move which could be progressive.
So I conclude that neither Poussette quite round nor Allemande is progressive.
Campbell's hands 6 round suggests a triple minor but all the other figures are either for the 1s+2s or the 1s alone, Changing the circle six to circle four easily makes for a duple minor.
Normally a command Allemande would only be addressed to the 1st couple, but this dance is so symmetrical (at least when viewed as a duple minor) that I think it should be extended to the 2s as well.
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.
The dances of George Williams (including interpretations like this one) are licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license.
| A1 | 1-2 | All set |
| 3-4 | Partner change | |
| 5-8 | All set again and change back | |
| A2 | 1-4 | 1s lead below 2s, turn, lead to 2nd place as 2s lead up |
| 5-6 | Right hands across half... | |
| 7-8 | ...and left hands back | |
| B1 | 1-8 | Full poussette, M2+W1 push |
| B2 | 1-4 | Circle left four |
| 5-8 | Regency allemande |
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.
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https://www.upadouble.info/redirect.php?id=TheMarchionessOfBlandfordsReel-Williams
The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2023 by George Williams. And is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. 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.
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.