Waltz or Slow Waltz

Ralph

Ralph

New Member
I don't speak English as a first language, so I don't know the answer to this.
I always thought the dance was called the Slow Waltz. But on dancing with the Stars and Shall We Dance they just say the Waltz. So what is it?
 
Ralph said:
I don't speak English as a first language, so I don't know the answer to this.
I always thought the dance was called the Slow Waltz. But on dancing with the Stars and Shall We Dance they just say the Waltz. So what is it?
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I believe "Waltz" is just another (shorter) way of saying "Slow Waltz." In my experience, "slow waltz" is now just called "waltz" and "viennese waltz" is either called "viennese" or "viennese waltz." This all refers to more casual settings ... at Blackpool, I would guess that they would be more inclined to use the full, formal, more traditional terms for the dances ...? Please correct me if i'm wrong here ...
 
There is a European tendency to call it "slow waltz", but this is a very old practice. In 1910, if a gentleman asked you to dance a waltz, be prepared for a viennese, but in 2010, a waltz is generally the slower form of the dance. Since (slow) waltz is the more common dance, it gets the shorter, casual name.
 
The only time I've heard the waltz referred to as the "slow waltz" is usually said with some sort of a European accent by a comp announcer, e.g. at Blackpool or the UK Championships... In regular parlance, it's always just a waltz.
 
Most of the time it seems that I see "slow waltz" written on dance music CDs--referring more to tempo it seems, so that the user can differentiate it from listings titled Viennese Waltz. A lot waltzes that get danced socially are not what I would call "slow waltz": they are definitely not the correct tempo--much too fast, but they're fun songs so people dance to them anyway.
 
in 2010.......

Porfirio Landeros said:
What other revelations do you have from the future?
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I've got plenty of guesses.....lemme just fire up the good ole' crystal ball....
Porfirio Landeros said:
Who wins Dancing with the Stars season 6?
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William Shatner, much to the dancing world's dismay, especially when we saw him dressed for Latin.
Porfirio Landeros said:
What stocks should I buy?
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Nothing involving the oil tycoons - those'll go downhill fast around 2008. I'd stay away from Microsoft too.
 
Keelzorz said:
William Shatner, much to the dancing world's dismay, especially when we saw him dressed for Latin.
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Oy! The mental image! Too funny though...

Keelzorz said:
I'd stay away from Microsoft too.
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And here I thought that was just a general rule of thumb? ;)
 
Ralph said:
I don't speak English as a first language, so I don't know the answer to this.
I always thought the dance was called the Slow Waltz.
Click to expand...

The short story: Vienneese was invented first, so there was a time when if you said "waltz", everyone assumed that was what you meant. But that was a long time ago. From what I've read about it, the slow waltz originated in the Northeast U.S. around 1900, and was originally referred to as the "Boston waltz". Somewhere, people started using "slow waltz" to refer to the Boston waltz to avoid confusion. Sometime later in the 20th century (I'm not sure when), the slow waltz overtook the Viennese waltz in popularity, and then people started using just "waltz" to mean the slow waltz, and if you really meant Viennese waltz, you had to say so. That's pretty much the usage today in most places. If you say "slow waltz" in anything other than a historical context, people may assume you're a snob.

And a historical P.S.: Apparently the Viennese waltz was regard as quite scandalous when it first appeared, around 1870. I recall reading something about the women dancing with their skirts over the men's heads... :shock:
 
cornutt said:
And a historical P.S.: Apparently the Viennese waltz was regard as quite scandalous when it first appeared, around 1870. I recall reading something about the women dancing with their skirts over the men's heads... :shock:
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hmm, sounds like floorcraft was a bit of a nightmare! :D
 
I remember in HARVEY GIRLS (a Judy Garland musical from the 1940's set in the late 1800s in the southwest) a group of young women taught local men "the waltz"--it was definitely more of a viennese waltz. The head teacher said: "Folks we're gonna teach ya a brand new dance. It's a dance that's all the rage way back east in Kansas City. It's the first dance ever heard of where the fellow puts his arm around the lady's waist".
 
cornutt said:
And a historical P.S.: Apparently the Viennese waltz was regard as quite scandalous when it first appeared, around 1870. I recall reading something about the women dancing with their skirts over the men's heads... :shock:
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Not sure about the skirts over mens' heads, but it sounds intriguing! Maybe I'll see if that can be arranged at my studio's next party! :raisebro: But seriously, there was quite a bit of opposition to the waltz, in several countries (France and Britain included). It was considered quite inappropriate for men and women to dance so close together. They must not have seen Dirty Dancing at that point yet.

But many dances evolved that way... American Rumba, for example, is so drastically different from native Cuban rumba for a reason: danced in its native Cuban form it would not be a socially acceptable dance :).
 
Twilight_Elena said:
Waltz? Scandalous? They obviously didn't know about salsa back then. :lol: Poor depraved Europeans.

Twilight Elena
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Depraved AND deprived. ;)
 
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