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Kujawy
The kujawiak – the dance of the Kujawy region – was originally danced with a calm dignity and simplicity, in a smooth, flowing manner. The couples spun around in a seemingly endlessly rotating circle and gently stamp their feet from time to time. The melody of the dance is often compared to the endless and peaceful landscapes of the region. The kujawiak was typically the last dance of the evening.
The dance dates back to 1827. In the Kujawy area, folk dances grouped under the label of the kujawiak have different names, depending on the particular figures used in them: ksebka (to oneself) – with turns to the left; odsibka (from oneself) – with turns to the right; gładki
(smooth), owczarek (shepherd), okrągły (round), etc. The village DJ or the best man at weddings decided the changes in rhythm and direction.
Famed ethnographer, folklorist and composer Oskar Kolberg knew the dance very well. He wrote down over 1,000 melodies and songs from Kujawy in two volumes describing the folklore of this area. The kujawiak reached peak popularity in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Warsaw and Masovia
The regional dyny dance resembles the contradance. It is danced by four couples standing in a square, usually at the climax of the evening. The dance is so fast that it's easy to get the steps wrong. The rhythm speeds up to eventually make it impossible for the couples to keep on dancing.
Additionally, Masovia is home to the legendary mazurka, which was composed by the greats (Chopin, Szymanowski) and danced by the greats (Pina Bausch). Before it was danced outside of Poland, as painter and ethnographer Andrzej Bieńkowski relates, the mazurka was the music and the dance of peasants under the feudal system who were forced to work on landowners' farms. And so, the rhythm of the music is the rhythm of their work.
In the countryside, the sound of the flail and the mazurka were in harmony. When three people were chopping cabbage at the same time, you would get a triple rhythm. Musicians would often play to ease the process of reaping the harvest or for carpenters at work. Everyone had a different way of decorating the music, I would listen to birds, nightingales and larks, and then puts these trills into the mazurka – one of the village musicians told the ethnographer.
Also originating in the villages of Mazowsze in central Poland, the oberek is one of the most popular traditional dances. It is danced by couples to instrumental music in triple meter and there are hundreds if not thousands of oberek melodies, with new ones being discovered by folk researchers.
An oberek is faster than a mazurek; it is danced by couples who are placed on a circle and rotate both around the whole circle and around their own axis (to the right). Their steps have to be light and flexible – they make dragging movements with their feet. People used to say that a good dancer could be recognised if he could dance the oberek in small steps with a full glass of water on his head. The choreography also involves jumps, stumping and spinning. The oberek dates back to the 17th century.
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The Polonaise
The last of the Polish traditional folk dances is the elegant polonaise, a ballroom dance danced at the opening of the evening. It has other names: chodzony (walking dance), pieszy (pedestrian), or
chmielowy (hops). Although it belonged to the repertoire of the nobility, it has folk roots.
Dancing the polonaise requires a straight, upright posture with no hip movements, smooth and elegant hand gestures, and the head held high, with pride. Frederic Chopin composed many polonaises.