Basse Danse

The basse danse, or "low dance", was the most popular court dance in the 15th and early 16th centuries, especially at the Burgundian court, often in a combination of 6/4 and 3/2 time allowing for use of hemiola. The word basse describes the nature of the dance, in which partners move quietly and gracefully in a slow gliding or walking motion without leaving the floor, and contrasts with livelier dances in which both feet left the floor in jumps or leaps. The basse danse later led to the development of the pavane. The latter half of a basse danse consisted occasionally of a tourdion, due to their contrasting tempi, and both were danced alongside the Pavane and galliard, and the allemande and courante, also in pairs. The earliest record of a basse danse dates to the 1320s and is found in an Occitan poem of Raimon de Cornet, who notes that the joglars performed them.

Monophonic songs were based on a tenor cantus firmus; the length of the choreography was often derived from popular chansons. In performance, 3 or 4 instrumentalists would improvise the polyphony based on this tenor. In others, multiple parts were written, though in the style of the day choices regarding instrumentation were left to the performers. Most famous, perhaps, are the basse danses assembled in 1530 by Pierre Attaingnant that remain today in "The Attaingnant Dance Prints", which included parts for four voices which were typically improvised upon by adding melodic embellishment (as Attaingnant rarely included such ornamentation, with occasional exceptions such as "Pavin of Albart", an embellishment upon "Pavane 'Si je m'en vois'"). Basse danses from this collection have been revisited and recorded by various ensembles including the Josef Ulsamer & Ulsamer Collegium. Most basse danses consisted of a binary form with each section repeated, such as the "No. 1: Basse Danse" from the publication "Danseries a 4 parties" by Pierre Attaingnant, published in 1547.