Auld Lang Syne ~ Williams

Auld Lang Syne ~ Williams Auld Lang Syne ~ RSCDS

Auld Lang Syne ~ Williams is an English Country Dance. It was devised by Thomas Wilson in 1816 and published in A Companion to the Ball Room, London. It was interpreted by George Williams in 2022. It is a proper Triple Minor dance. The minor set lasts 16 bars.

Wilson spells the title "Auld Langsyne".

Wilson writes (page 113):
SINGLE FIGURE (Each strain repeated)
The 3 ladies join hands & the 3 gent: join hands set & lead thro' set & back again set & change places with the 2d. Cu: set & allemande
OR THUS Set & half right & left with 2d. Cu: set & back again & whole poussette
DOUBLE FIGURE (Tune played twice thro' with repeats)
Cross over 2 Cu: set half figure on your own sides allemande at top whole poussette set contrary corners

Wilson usually gives multiple figures for each tune, I am following the DOUBLE FIGURE.

The music is two 4 bar strains. Wilson says each is repeated, and then the whole tune repeated. The description of the dance has 4 phrase markers with two dots under them ( ) which Wilson uses to mean two repetitions of that strain (see page x).

Unfortunately the music I have is played at 4 counts per bar rather than the intended two so I am rearranged things so that each phrase marker represents one time through the strain.

Wilson defines most of his figures in his An Analysis of Country Dancing.
Cross over 2 Cu: may be found on page 22 and means "cross go below 2s, cross again, go below 3s".
half figure on your own sides may be found on page 67 and means "weave around the dancers on your own side, move between the couple above, then outside the next couple, finishing at top." Wilson does not make it clear whether the active dancers pass by right or left. The modern convention seems to be by right on the first cross, left on the second.
allemande may be found on page 7 and appears to mean a gypsy (or perhaps a back-to-back). This is an unusual meaning for "allemande", but, as best as I can understand, that is what Wilson describes.
poussette may be found on page 53 and means "top two couples join hands with partner, circle, counter-clockwise, one and a half times around the other couple to change places with them.
set contrary corners may be found on pages 55-57 and means "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, but I expect modern dancers would want to.

The tune is a traditional one, and the music was synthesized by Colin Hume's software.

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 dances of George Williams (including interpretations like this one) are licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license.

A11-11s cross by right, go below 2s
2-31s cross again, but by left, go below 3s
4-41s set
A21-21s weave up their own sides, between 3s, outside 2s finishing home
3-41s right gypsy
B11-4Take partner's hands, W1,M2 push, poussette at top counter clockwise, once and a half to progress
B21-41s set to 1st corners, pass right, set to 2nd corners, return home

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=AuldLangsyne-Williams

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The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2022 by George Williams. And is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2022 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
Creative Commons License 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.