Ely Court

Ely Court is an English Country Dance. It was published by Henry Playford (website) in 1701 in The Dancing Master, 11th ed.. It was interpreted by Andrew Shaw in 2024 and published in The Irish Howle. Originally a Triple Minor this version is a proper 3 Couple Longways dance. In this dance the couples are permuted by: 312. The minor set lasts 30 bars.

Playford writes:

All four cross right-hands half round, then left hands and back to their places, the 1st. man and 1st. woman cast off two couple and lead up and cast off into the 2d. couple's place, the 3. first men lead out and back again, the 3 1st. women do the same at the same time, then 1st man goes round the 2d. woman, and the 1st. woman goes round the 3. man at the same time, the 1st. man and 1st. woman sets one to another and turns his Partner and falls below the 2d. couple. 2d. Strain once.

Shaw warns that the heys are difficult for the 3s.

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 dance contains the following figures: hand turn (allemande), set, cast, lead, hands across, hey, mirror hey (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=ElyCourt

The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2024 by Andrew Shaw. 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.