Mozart and Dance - Dance Music Composed By Mozart - Genres - Contredanse

Contredanse

The contredanse was a form descended from English Country Dance. Like its ancestor, it was rich in figures (individual movements and patterns) and was popular among all social classes.

Mozart composed contredanses as a sequence of multiple sections. They sometimes quote popular melodies; for instance, K. 609 quotes the aria "Non piu andrai" from Mozart's opera The Marriage of Figaro.

Of the three genres, minuets predominate in Mozart's early career, the latter two types later on.

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