The Spring

The Spring is an English Country Dance. It was devised by Thomas Bray in 1699 and published in Country Dances: Being a Composition Entirely New, London. It is a proper Duple Minor dance. The minor set lasts 24 bars.

Bray writes:

The first and second Man move up two or three steps, and turn back to the left to their own places again; We. move down at the same time and do the same Each Man changing places with his Wo. with the right Hand, Men with their Faces down, We. with theirs up, then all turn single to the left Hand from each other, to each others place; Men being Improper First Man and second Wo. goes half round their own Partners on the outside, and turn right Hands round, the first Man ends below, the second Wo. above The first Wo. and second Man do the same after them And so to the end.

Pat Shaw addes that neutral couples should join in A1.

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.

A11-4Turn left, move up or down a double, cast left back
A21-4Change places with partner taking right hands then turn single left
B11-4M1+W2 loop outside partner, counter-clockwise, into each other's place
5-8Right hands across
B21-4W1+M2 loop outside same-sex neighbor, clockwise, into each other's place
5-8Left hands across

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=TheSpring

< Prev Top Next >

The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 1965 by . 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.