Collection of popular song and dance sheet music
Overview
Collection of popular sheet music, primarily from the United States and France, with accompanying dance instructions for each piece.
Dates
- Creation: circa 1840-1966
Condition Description
Mostly good condition. Requires careful handling. Possibly moldy pieces have been set aside for treatment.
Conditions Governing Access
Collection is open for research.
This collection is shelved offsite. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff to determine retrieval policies and times.
Extent
.5 linear feet ((2 boxes) )118 pieces of sheet music in the popular genre, all of which contain instructions to dances intended to be performed by listeners. These instructions can be found in multiple locations, depending on the piece. Some are printed on the inside covers of the sheet music, some are printed on removable inserts, and others contain dance instructions within the song lyrics themselves. Most text is in English and French. One piece is in German, and another is in Swedish. Dance and music styles represented include ballroom, country, swing, and jazz, among others.
Biographical / Historical
Social dancing is dancing for primarily recreational purposes, in contrast to performative or artistic dancing. Traditional social dances have evolved drastically across different cultures and through the centuries. The first written records of social dances in Europe are descriptions of court dances in 15th century Brussels. Court dancing, and later ballroom and country dancing, remained popular styles of social dance until the 19th century. In the late 19th and early 20th century, dance styles which originated in African American communities spread to popular culture and became the new popular social dances. Swing and jazz dancing are examples of this.
Arrangement
Arranged as received.
Physical Location
Harvard Depository
Custodial History
Ownership prior to this acquisition is unknown.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Purchased from Marc Selvaggio using the Ruth Neils and John M. Ward Fund, 2023 March 8.
Processing Information
This collection was processed to a basic level with minimal rehousing, organization, and preservation. (Aurora Charlow, 2023)
- Title
- Collection of popular song and dance sheet music, circa 1840-1966, (MS Thr 2260): Guide
- Status
- completed
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard University
- Date
- 2023 April 6
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS)
- Language of description
- eng
- EAD ID
- hou03545
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.
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