Dances from an Old Music Book

by Bernhard Hanneken

Through many generations, the Dahlhoff family served as parish clerks in a small town in Westphalia. Part of their job was to play music - for religious and secular ceremonies, for concerts and dances. But unlike their colleagues, they also notated what they played. Today the ten volumes (with more than 1,000 dance tunes) they collected are preserved in the Berliner Staatsbibliothek (Berlin National Library). The material gives a fascinating insight into the dance and entertainment repertoire of rural Germany some two centuries ago. Malbrooks Tanzkapelle bring some of these tunes to the stage, supplemented with a handful of dance tunes from other manuscripts.

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