The Story of the Waltz
The Original Dance Underground
By Adam Sky, October 2010
What's in a Waltz?
The waltz, with an accent on the first beat of every measure, is immediately recognisable from its ¾ timing; with each series of movements involving a turning step and a close. In contrast to popular belief, the waltz was not initially a formal dance for toffs with strict(ly) ballroom steps that must be adhered to. Quite the opposite, it involved grabbing the nearest desirable human being and whisking them around with reckless abandon. Only much later did it evoke connotations of stuffy institutionalism, becoming commodified in a way which we have come to know as synonymous with subcultural innovations.
In a direct parallel to the acid house movement of the late 1980's, the waltz was the first dance scene that anybody and everybody could immediately take part in as it broke down rigid class barriers.
One Bavarian citizen of the period commented:
"The people here are excessively fond of the pleasure of dancing; they need only hear the music of a waltz to begin to caper, no matter where they are. The public dance floors are visited by ALL classes; these are the places where ancestors and rank seem to be forgotten and aristocratic pride laid aside. Here we see artisans, artists, merchants, councillors, barons, counts and excellencies dancing together with waitresses, women of the middle class, and ladies. Every stranger who stays here for a while is infected by this dance malady."
Doesn't this remind us of spontaneous outbreaks of dancing in service station car parks around the M25, with the double-barrel named Mr. Bigs of acid house unified with loved-up football firms - and everyone else in between?
Reaching the suburbs and shocking many when it was first introduced, the waltz became very fashionable in Vienna around the 1780s, spreading across the globe in the years to follow. The waltz involved robust moves and lots of space. Often partners were hurled into the air in moves that occasionally resulted in injury or miscarriage. Imagine the nimble-toed dandies and their wenches hot-footing it over discarded foetuses on the dance floor! The waltzers were twirling themselves into a state of uncontrolled euphoria, and the three quarter rhythm was here to stay.
From the Ballroom to Hell
But what was the big scandal about the waltz anyway?
Religious leaders almost unanimously regarded the waltz as vulgar and sinful, just as they did rock 'n' roll a couple of centuries later. As far as they were concerned this was 'The Devil's Dance'.
It was also the first dance termed 'The Forbidden Dance' (not the tango as is widely believed). Although there were some European dances with erotic undertones, the waltz was unlike these in that you didn't need a dance master to instruct you; therefore the scandalous touching was inevitable. Couples were described as clinging to each other, with the lady wrapping her concealing cloak around them both as they whirled off to the darker recesses of the candlelit halls, where they could indulge in some hasty oral or suchlike. Not so badly regarded by the family if the guy was a duke at an elite ball; but probably not so well received if he was a social climbing delinquent who the lady had met moments before.
Old Romantic
Eighteenth century Vienna was the music capital of the world, not unlike New York or London of the 1960s, 70s and 80s. It had become the vibrant musical hub of the Romantic Movement; a new social trend that rebelled against the conventional rules, well-ordered symmetry and the emotional restraint that characterized the classicism of the previous era.
The Romantic Movement placed emphasis on the spontaneous unpredictability of individual expression, and the exaltation of the senses and emotions over reason and intellect. Believing that art was meant to educate, enlighten and entertain the masses and not just satisfy the privileged few, social rank and status no longer dictated participation in the creation or consumption of art.
This climate provided a rich and fertile breeding ground for the evolution of music and dance and gave birth to some splendidly forward thinking dissident spirits. Composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Schubert all wrote early waltzes. Later on came Beethoven, but the true Godfathers of the Viennese waltz were Johann Strauss Sr. and Josef Lanner.
These early pioneers of the waltz sound freely borrowed melodies and motifs from each other, sometimes with deep respect and other times with playful irony, much like the sampling and recycling common in modern age club music. Many of the early compositions were direct plagiarisms of the traditional Austrian folk music that the dance itself derived from. What goes around comes around indeed...
You cannot imagine the wild enthusiasm that these men generated in Vienna. Newspapers went into raptures over each new waltz, writing extensively about both Johann Strauss Sr. and Josef Lanner. However it was Strauss's son, also named Johann who is predominantly associated with the style, having created the most famous waltz tunes of all. 'The Blue Danube' and 'Wine, Women and Song' - the latter of which was the 'Sex and Drugs and Rock'n'Roll' of its day.
Johann Strauss Jr. was the musician most regularly awarded the accolade 'The Waltz King', which is the equivalent of being crowned the World's Best DJ in today's terms. During his great concert tours of Europe from England to Russia he had to fight his way to the stage and was besieged by women for locks of his hair. He instigated a true 'Strauss Hysteria' that continued throughout his journey to America in 1872. He played the biggest waltz gig of all time in Boston, inspiring thousands. He was undoubtedly the world's first international pop idol...
Viennese Whirl
We all love the pink wigged piss-artist, Mozart, who, though not a waltz purist, was around the Vienna scene in the early days and was a notable admirer of the genre. In one of his operas, 'Don Giovanni', three waltzes are played at once in one scene! The modern day parallel to this is perhaps akin to a present day rock or hip-hop icon getting a grime remix. Another Mozart classic, written in 1782, was his choral song, 'Lick me in the Arse' ('Leck Mich im Arsch'). Though not strictly a waltz as it was an acapella piece, it was, however, in 3/4 time, and therefore it could be waltzed to. Incidentally anagrams of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart are 'A famous German waltz God', 'Gorgeous waltz fan, Madam' as is 'Zealous warm 'n' mad faggot'. Amadeus was THE proto punk rocker of the romantic age.
You can't stop the Waltz
By the early 1800s, chic Paris had fallen in love with the waltz, and was soon followed by the rest of Europe. For this, we can largely thank Napoleon Bonaparte. If he hadn't wanted all of Europe for himself, we might never have known the waltz; the Congress of Vienna held in 1814 was sound-tracked by the now ubiquitous rhythm. Its purported major function was the divvying up of the small princedoms of Europe, following Napoleon's disastrous invasions. Because of the glitterati in attendance, it became known as the 'Waltzing Congress'.
The waltz had begun its triumphal conquest of the whole continent, and could not be obstructed by the violent protests of hostile moralists who warned people of the evil consequences of this new dance fever.
Oom Pah Pah, Oom Pah Pah
That's how it goes ...
The waltz was first imported to England by the notorious drunkard and eccentric, The Prince Regent. Renowned for building that glorified drug den, the Brighton Pavilion, there could not have been a finer ambassador for the 'riotous and indecent' new dance craze that was poised to sweep the nation.
This review of his first event appeared in The Times on 16th July, 1816:
"We remarked with pain that the indecent foreign dance called the Waltz was introduced (we believe for the first time) at the English court on Friday last....it is quite sufficient to cast one's eyes on the voluptuous intertwining of the limbs and close compressure on the bodies in their dance, to see that it is indeed far removed from the modest reserve which has hitherto been considered distinctive of English females. So long as this obscene display was confined to prostitutes and adulteresses, we did not think it deserving of notice; but now that it is attempted to be forced on the respectable classes of society by the civil examples of their superiors, we feel it a duty to warn every parent against exposing his daughter to so fatal a contagion."
But as history repeats itself over and over again, the outrage only served to increase the popularity of the waltz. Before becoming widely accepted by The Establishment, the waltz had also found its natural home in the secretive and elitist 'Hellfire Clubs' that were popular among the more anarchic and free thinking people of the era. These truly subversive fraternities were the precursors to underground after-hours parties as we know them today. Adopting an anything goes policy, which included masked orgies, bestiality and indulging in the new-fangled opiates imported from South East Asia, the hedonistic waltz rhythm provided the perfect playlist.
Pop the Waltz
In the 1950s Elvis Presley, the King of Rock and Roll himself, released 'Are You Lonesome Tonight?', slow-waltzing the teenyboppers into a state of melancholy bliss, and another rock 'n' roll luminary, Screamin' Jay Hawkins growled and screeched his way through the wild waltz of 'I Put a Spell On You'.
In the 1960s the waltz popped up its pretty head from experimental B-sides on Motown, through to the work of drug-frazzled misfits such as Syd Barrett ('Long Gone', 'Dark Globe'), and Nico ('Ode to Lenny Bruce', 'Winter Song').
In 1970s Great Britain, the waltz's slightly surreal and comic eroticism resurfaced in the hypnotic and haunting TV theme tunes of 'PictureBox' and 'Tales of the Unexpected' and also, unexpectedly became ammunition for punk rock heroes The Damned ('These Hands') The Clash ('Rebel Waltz') and Siouxsie and the Banshees ('Playground Twist', 'Melt').
The 1980s dealt us waltzes from maverick superchick Kate Bush ('Army Dreamers'), The Stranglers' spooky 'Waltzinblack' and the sublime 'Golden Brown' along with a sprinkling of other pop oddities like electro-pop purveyors OMD and the ground-breaking, drum-machine wielding Cocteau Twins. The soulful Dexy's Midnight Runners also had a couple of impassioned waltzes in their repertoire.
At the end of the decade, the late great cultural architect Malcolm McLaren, perhaps 20 years too early, unleashed his ambitious 'Waltz Darling' album upon the populous. Whilst aesthetically on the ball, and inspiring many as always, it was a little disappointing for real waltzers because McLaren had purportedly got bored of the project half way through, ditching the ¾ rhythms and resorting to regular house and hip hop beats of the era.
In the 1990s whilst the dust was still settling after the rave explosion, waltzes were few and far between, apart from the occasional revelatory tune such as 'Think About Me' by Artful Dodger, or more inaccessible and so-called 'Intelligent Dance Music' tracks.
And the beat goes on …
Although by now the waltz has permeated just about every genre of music known to man, especially folk music from places as diverse as South America, Scandinavia and Texas, a lot of current electronic producers have yet to clock the benefits of the 3/4 time signature, which is just one click away on their digital sequencing software. The old Oom Pah Pah can open myriad seas of euphonious inspiration, simply by placing the artist outside of the constraints of the usual pedestrian 4/4 time, transporting them into some parallel intoxicating 3/4 tempo universe. People dancing together and healthy competition amongst music makers has always been the impetus of massively significant cultural shifts, and indeed good times.
In 1919, H.L. Melken wrote:
"The waltz never quite goes out of fashion; it is always just around the corner; every now and then it returns with a bang....It is sneaking, insidious, disarming, lovely....The waltz, in fact, is magnificently improper.. the art of tone turned lubricious...."
What the world really needs now is a NEO-WALTZ REVOLUTION not least because in a world where smoking has been banned just about everywhere, the excuse of asking someone you're attracted to for a fag or a light is no longer a valid option, so what better prelude to a fuck than "Would you like to dance?"