Folk Dances
Dance has existed in Ukraine as a ritual since ancient times, but it was mostly absorbed by Christianity and blended with Christian rituals. The earliest dances were circle dances concerned with agriculture. Dances took place on Ivan Kupala day, St. George's day, Pentacost, days of harvest, and weddings. Ritual dances were rarely performed to music, and usually to a chant. Folk dances were performed with or without music. The majority of Ukrainian folk dances are circular. Some of the most famous dances are the Arkan and Hopak. Dance was also enriched with traditional Ukrainian folk dress. Today many Ukrainian dance groups exist in Ukraine and the Ukrainian diaspora, particularly in Canada, and have kept the tradition of folk dancing alive.
Read more about this topic: Ukrainian Folklore
Famous quotes containing the words folk and/or dances:
“Some folk want their luck buttered.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)
“When I wrote of the women in their dances and wildness, it was a mask,
on their mountain, gold-hunting, singing, in orgy,
it was a mask; when I wrote of the god,
fragmented, exiled from himself, his life, the love gone down with song,
it was myself, split open, unable to speak, in exile from myself.
...
No more masks! No more mythologies!”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)