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Lesson 32: Baroque Dance Forms

  • Recognise four Baroque dance forms by their tempo, meter, and characteristic rhythm.
  • Play one piece in each form.

A Baroque suite is not a collection of pieces. It is one dance after another.

The Baroque suite — allemande, courante, sarabande, gigue — is one dance after another, and the rhythmic character of each dance is what gives the music its identity. Play a sarabande as a march and it ceases to be a sarabande.

Allemande — 4/4, moderate, with anacrusis

A steady walking dance that always begins with a short upbeat — usually one or three sixteenths into the first downbeat.

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Courante — 3/4 or 3/2, lively

The Italian corrente is fast and running; the French courante is slower and uses hemiola (a brief two-against-three feel). Either way: in three, energetic.

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Sarabande — 3/4, slow, weight on beat 2

The suite's slow movement: dignified, leaning, often its emotional core.

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Gigue — 6/8 or 12/8, fast

The closing dance: compound meter, fast tempo, often contrapuntal.

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Now play these

Bourrée
Another Baroque dance form — bright, duple-meter, leaning quarter notes.
Gavotte
4/4 with phrase upbeats on beat 3 — the gavotte's signature.
Gigue
A short gigue, fast and lilting.
Pavane
The Renaissance ancestor of the slow Baroque dances.

When you can identify a Baroque dance type by listening to its first bar — and play it so a listener can identify it too — move on to Lesson 33.