Annotation:Silver Lake (2)
X: 1 T: "the SILVER LAKE" VARSOVIANA R: Varsoviana %R: varsoviana, waltz B: James Kerr "Merry Melodies" v.4 p.47 #425 Z: 2016 John Chambers <jc:trillian.mit.edu> N: There are "1st time", "2nd time", "3rd time" bracketed notations above the 2nd, 3rd, 4th strains. N: These have been omitted, since they're just a redundant way of of indicating a rondo, which the "D.C." markings also do. M: 3/4 L: 1/8 F:http://www.john-chambers.us/~jc/music/book/Kerr/MM4/4425_the_Silver_Lake_Varsoviana.abc K: G B>c |\ d2 g2 f2 | c4 A>B |c2 e2 d2 | B4 B>B |B2 A2 B2 | c4 c>d | e2 F2 F2 | G4 ::G2 |e>^d e2 G2 | d>^c d2 G2 |c>B c2 d2 | d4 G2 |e>^d e2 G2 | d>^c d2 G2 |c>B c2 F2 | "_D.C."G4 :| |:d2 |b>^a b2 d2 | b>^a b2 d2 |b>^a b2 c'2 | a4 d2 |a>^g a2 d2 | a>^g a2 d2 | a>^g a2 b2 | "_D.C."G4 ::[K:=f] E>F |G>^F G2 G2 | A>^G A2 A2 | B>A B2 G2 | c4 G2 |e>^d e2 G2 | d>^c d2 A2 |B>A B2 g2 | "_D.C."c4 :|
SILVER LAKE [2], THE. AKA and see "Varsoviana," "Kick a Dutchman." English, Varsovienne (3/4 time). G Major ('A', 'B', & 'C' parts) & D Major ('D' part) {Trim}: G Major {Bayard}. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB (Bayard): AABBCCDD (Trim). "Silver Lake," a varsovienne "danced at all the Nobilitys Balls", was first published around 1850. William Henry Montgomery (1811?-1886) is sometimes credited as the composer of the tune, although he may only have fashioned the arrangement. He was an English composer of dance and vocal music, arranger and conductor, formerly a pupil of William_Shield. He directed music and Sadler's Wells, Covent Garden and the Strand Theatre, and composed for a long series of pantomimes that ran at various venues. Some of his songs were quite popular in his time. Samuel Bayard, however, opines that "everything about" the air suggests it is German in origin and that it uses international strains.
In 1866 during the Canadian gold-rush Robert Burrell grumbled in a letter that the music from Bakerville’s Hurdie house across the street was disturbing his sleep. He mentioned four of the songs that were ringing in his ears: "Silver Lakes Varsovianna,” "King of the Cannibal Islands,” "Sultan Polka" & "Edinburgh Quadrille (The).” By the end of the century the dance, which reached its height of popularity mid-century, seems to have fallen out of fashion. The editor of The Ballroom Guide[1] opined: "...it formerly had a sort of ephemeral popularity. We always considered it as rather a boisterous sort of performance, and more suitable for the casino than the private ballroom."
- ↑ Frederick Warne, The Ballroom Guide, London and New York: Frederick Warne and Co., 1888, p. 61.