Emperor of the Moon

Emperor of the Moon is an English Country Dance. It was published by Henry Playford (website) in 1690 in The Dancing Master, 8th ed., London. It was interpreted by Andrew Shaw in 2006 and published in Emperor of the Moon. Found in The Playford Assembly. It is a proper Duple Minor dance. The minor set lasts 32 bars. Someone thought this dance was Intermediate.

Playford writes:
The two men set to their own, then all four single, then the two men hands, (the two we. the same at the same time,) and meet and set, then the 1. cu. cast off to the second proper, and the 2. cu. cross over to the second improper, then the 2. wo. hands with the 1. wo. and turn to the second proper, (the 2. man at the same time with the 1. man to second proper, the the 1.cu. the same, which brings them to the second proper.

The tune was published by Playford with the dance, and the music was synthesized by Colin Hume's software.

The animation plays at 109 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: hand turn (allemande), set, turn single, cast, lead, figure eight, 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=EmperorOfTheMoon

< Prev Top Next >

The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2006 by Andrew Shaw. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2018 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.