Nos lowen Dance Steps.
What follows is a little overview of the main steps used in nos lowen dances.
I won’t attempt to teach the dance steps here: By far the best way to learn them is to go to a nos lowen or a workshop and have a go or have a look at some online clips. However, it might be helpful, or at least interesting, to both nos lowen dance leaders and musicians, to have an idea of how some of the steps relate to each other.
The archetypal Cornish dance step is the Furry step or 1-2-3-hop which fits straightforward steady 4/4 tunes (i.e. furries and jowsters). It consists of doing a right, left, then right step, then a hop on the spot, followed by the same thing again but starting on the left foot. In nos lowen dancing the ‘hop’ is very often reduced to just a ‘bob’ on the spot without leaving the ground. The Furry step is very closely related to the step done in a Breton An Dro – which is basically the same thing but stepping sideways rather than forwards and starting on the left instead of the right foot. This link was the inspiration for the Oll Adro nos lowen dance, which celebrates the connection between these fundamental and ancient Cornish and Breton steps by switching between them during the course of the dance.
This step has several close relatives, or ‘stepbrothers and sisters’ if you like, amongst the other Cornish / nos lowen dance steps:
- The Jowster 4 (usually just known as the Jowster) is very much the same except that the first step goes behind the other foot, so you could describe it as ‘behind-2-3-hop’.
- If you miss out the fourth beat of the Furry step (i.e. the ‘hop’ in the '1-2-3-hop'), and also don’t shift your weight onto step ‘2’, you are left basically with the Waltz step which can be danced to the slower 3/4 tunes (i.e. waltzes!). It’s important not to leave a pause where the ‘hop’ would be though, otherwise you are still in 4/4 time and it won’t fit 3/4 tunes.
- Similarly, if you do the same with the Jowster 4 step, you arrive at a what we call the Jowster 3 which can also be danced to slower tempo waltzes.
- The Hanter Jowster is related to the Jowster 4 step in the same way that the Breton Hanter Dro is related to the An Dro. It is basically, starting on the right foot: ‘behind-2-3-hop-1-hop’ (or ‘behind-2-3-hop-5-hop’ if you like). It is usually danced to slower tunes in 6/4, that is, tunes with six beats to the bar rather than four. The ‘hop’ is invariably reduced to a ‘bob’. ‘Hanter’ is both Cornish and Breton for ‘Half’, and is a reference to it being effectively a Jowster (or An Dro) plus an extra half a bar. Taking our lead from this, we gave it the name Hanter Jowster, although it could equally well be referred to as a ‘Jowster 6’.
The following nos lowen dance steps could also perhaps be considered to be cousins of the 1-2-3-hop, although it is not so useful to be aware of this as it is with the steps mentioned already.
- The Polka step, which is the same in Cornwall as it is elsewhere around the world, and is used for instance in the Ros Vean nos lowen dance, is much like a speeded up ‘1-2-3-hop’, but where you don't shift your weight onto step '2'.
- The Jig step, used in the Scoot or Jig serpent, and the Hand-in-Hand, is also very similar. It seems to me to be very much like the polka step, but with some slight timing changes - in particular pausing for twice as long on steps 1 and 3 - which make it fit 6/8 jigs.
- The Kabm Pemp (or 'Cornish five-step') I suppose could, perhaps a bit tenuously, be considered to be related to the 1-2-3-hop but where step '1' involves your right foot stepping across in front of your left foot, where the 'hop' is replaced by a little kick or point of the left foot, and where there is an extra step at the end! So, you could describe it as 'across-2-3-point-5'. The kabm pemp dance was devised by Hilary Coleman and myself many years ago, in response to the Cornish 5/4 tunes we had, but for which there was no known dance. Just after we created this dance, we realised that it had much in common with the Kost ar C’hoat dance from Brittany, which is a nice connection we hadn’t expected. Put simply, the Kabm Pemp is like a Kost ar C’hoat but with the last 3 steps ‘sawn off’.
A little aside, regarding the kabm pemp: There’s no reason why you couldn’t do 'Furry 5' or ‘Jowster 5’ dances more closely based on the Furry (1-2-3-hop) or Jowster (behind-2-3-hop) steps, but which could be danced to kabm pemp tunes. You could either add an extra step in the middle so that it is '1-2-3-4-hop' (or 'behind-2-3-4-hop') or add the extra step at the end, so that it is '1-2-3-hop-5' or 'behind-2-3-hop-5'. This latter version would help accentuate the '1,2,3,1,2' emphasis of the beats in a kabm pemp, and would also be closer to the existing kabm pemp step. At the time of writing, however, there are no such dances using such steps – but they might be adopted as some nice alternatives in future!
...and last but not least!
One of the most popular nos lowen dances, not mentioned so far, is the Hedley, which uses a sideways shuffle step derived from the Mr Martin’s dance, and which I believe is not related to the Furry or Jowster step family at all.
I won’t attempt to teach the dance steps here: By far the best way to learn them is to go to a nos lowen or a workshop and have a go or have a look at some online clips. However, it might be helpful, or at least interesting, to both nos lowen dance leaders and musicians, to have an idea of how some of the steps relate to each other.
The archetypal Cornish dance step is the Furry step or 1-2-3-hop which fits straightforward steady 4/4 tunes (i.e. furries and jowsters). It consists of doing a right, left, then right step, then a hop on the spot, followed by the same thing again but starting on the left foot. In nos lowen dancing the ‘hop’ is very often reduced to just a ‘bob’ on the spot without leaving the ground. The Furry step is very closely related to the step done in a Breton An Dro – which is basically the same thing but stepping sideways rather than forwards and starting on the left instead of the right foot. This link was the inspiration for the Oll Adro nos lowen dance, which celebrates the connection between these fundamental and ancient Cornish and Breton steps by switching between them during the course of the dance.
This step has several close relatives, or ‘stepbrothers and sisters’ if you like, amongst the other Cornish / nos lowen dance steps:
- The Jowster 4 (usually just known as the Jowster) is very much the same except that the first step goes behind the other foot, so you could describe it as ‘behind-2-3-hop’.
- If you miss out the fourth beat of the Furry step (i.e. the ‘hop’ in the '1-2-3-hop'), and also don’t shift your weight onto step ‘2’, you are left basically with the Waltz step which can be danced to the slower 3/4 tunes (i.e. waltzes!). It’s important not to leave a pause where the ‘hop’ would be though, otherwise you are still in 4/4 time and it won’t fit 3/4 tunes.
- Similarly, if you do the same with the Jowster 4 step, you arrive at a what we call the Jowster 3 which can also be danced to slower tempo waltzes.
- The Hanter Jowster is related to the Jowster 4 step in the same way that the Breton Hanter Dro is related to the An Dro. It is basically, starting on the right foot: ‘behind-2-3-hop-1-hop’ (or ‘behind-2-3-hop-5-hop’ if you like). It is usually danced to slower tunes in 6/4, that is, tunes with six beats to the bar rather than four. The ‘hop’ is invariably reduced to a ‘bob’. ‘Hanter’ is both Cornish and Breton for ‘Half’, and is a reference to it being effectively a Jowster (or An Dro) plus an extra half a bar. Taking our lead from this, we gave it the name Hanter Jowster, although it could equally well be referred to as a ‘Jowster 6’.
The following nos lowen dance steps could also perhaps be considered to be cousins of the 1-2-3-hop, although it is not so useful to be aware of this as it is with the steps mentioned already.
- The Polka step, which is the same in Cornwall as it is elsewhere around the world, and is used for instance in the Ros Vean nos lowen dance, is much like a speeded up ‘1-2-3-hop’, but where you don't shift your weight onto step '2'.
- The Jig step, used in the Scoot or Jig serpent, and the Hand-in-Hand, is also very similar. It seems to me to be very much like the polka step, but with some slight timing changes - in particular pausing for twice as long on steps 1 and 3 - which make it fit 6/8 jigs.
- The Kabm Pemp (or 'Cornish five-step') I suppose could, perhaps a bit tenuously, be considered to be related to the 1-2-3-hop but where step '1' involves your right foot stepping across in front of your left foot, where the 'hop' is replaced by a little kick or point of the left foot, and where there is an extra step at the end! So, you could describe it as 'across-2-3-point-5'. The kabm pemp dance was devised by Hilary Coleman and myself many years ago, in response to the Cornish 5/4 tunes we had, but for which there was no known dance. Just after we created this dance, we realised that it had much in common with the Kost ar C’hoat dance from Brittany, which is a nice connection we hadn’t expected. Put simply, the Kabm Pemp is like a Kost ar C’hoat but with the last 3 steps ‘sawn off’.
A little aside, regarding the kabm pemp: There’s no reason why you couldn’t do 'Furry 5' or ‘Jowster 5’ dances more closely based on the Furry (1-2-3-hop) or Jowster (behind-2-3-hop) steps, but which could be danced to kabm pemp tunes. You could either add an extra step in the middle so that it is '1-2-3-4-hop' (or 'behind-2-3-4-hop') or add the extra step at the end, so that it is '1-2-3-hop-5' or 'behind-2-3-hop-5'. This latter version would help accentuate the '1,2,3,1,2' emphasis of the beats in a kabm pemp, and would also be closer to the existing kabm pemp step. At the time of writing, however, there are no such dances using such steps – but they might be adopted as some nice alternatives in future!
...and last but not least!
One of the most popular nos lowen dances, not mentioned so far, is the Hedley, which uses a sideways shuffle step derived from the Mr Martin’s dance, and which I believe is not related to the Furry or Jowster step family at all.