User:Archaeobuf/sandbox/Foxtrot

History
The foxtrot originated in New York as a dance to ragtime music, bursting onto the American dance scene in mid-July 1914. It quickly caught the eye of the husband and wife duo Vernon and Irene Castle and other leading dance instructors of the time, who played a major role in popularizing the dance.The new dance was brought to England during WW I, and subsequently split into separate American and English versions. Each of these further split into a slow version (the foxtrot of today) and a fast version (the American peabody and the British quickstep).

When jazz and swing music became popular in the 1920s and 1930s, the foxtrot was adapted to them. The American version was heavily revised during the 1920s and 30s by Arthur Murray, who introduced what is now the basic 6-count step of American Social Foxtrot and its variants. The American version was a staple of social dance from its inception through the 1940s, and is still in use today. The English version was standardized during the 1920s and 30s by Josephine Bradley, Alex Moore, and the Ballroom Section of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing (ISTD).

Beginnings in the US
Foxtrot was originally danced to ragtime music. It resembled the One-Step, but incorporated both sequences of slow steps (walks) and sequences of fast steps (trots). These alternated with figures borrowed from other dances, especially the two step, the Waltz, and the Maxixe. In the Castle's variant, the basic figure consisted of two slow steps (one measure) followed by four quick steps (also one measure), both with the man moving forward and the lady backwards. A variant by Joan Sawyer had four slow steps (two measures) followed by eight quick steps (also two measures). Other early variants had still other rhythmic patterns, the common feature being a sequence of slow steps alternating with a sequence of fast steps.

The Foxtrot first came to public attention in New York City in mid-July 1914. Newspaper references to the "Fox Trot" as a dance begin suddenly on July 16, 1914, and the Castle House began teaching the "Fox Trot" by July 25. It spread rapidly throughout the United States following a conference of dance instructors in Pittsburgh in early September, which declared it to be the latest in dance movements.

The origins of the foxtrot and its name were unclear even at its inception. Several dancers and dance instructors claimed credit for invention of a foxtrot or the foxtrot, or had the creation of a foxtrot or the foxtrot ascribed to them. Charles Coll, writing in 1919, already noted that he had "heard many versions of its origin" and had "listened to many of its self-styled originators", and proceeded to credit Vernon and Irene Castle with its invention. Numerous dance instructors participated in spreading variants of the new dance during the autumn of 1914, including Vernon and Irene Castle, Billy Kent and Jeanette Warner. Oscar Duryea, Joan Sawyer, and many others. Each apparently claimed credit for his or her own version, which may have consisted of nothing more than a specific sequence of foxtrot and related steps choreographed to a particular piece of music.

Attribution to Harry Fox
A popular hypothesis attributes both the inspiration for the dance and its name to the vaudeville actor Harry Fox, who allegedly trotted across the stage in a peculiar manner during his act. Stephenson and Iaccarino present a coherent and detailed exposition of this hypothesis. However, dance historian Nick Enge notes that primary sources from 1914 do not explicitly connect Harry Fox to the dance, and that Harry Fox himself does not seem to have claimed credit for its invention.

This hypothesis can be traced all the way back to 1914, but not to eyewitness sources. The November 1914 issue of Dancing Times, a British publication, quoted an article by F. Leslie Clendenen (a St. Louis dance instructor), which stated that the foxtrot is "…a nerve-wracking movement arranged by a vaudeville actor named Fox -- only a few weeks ago Mr. Fox was showing his original trot". The second 1914 edition of Clendenen's compendium "Dance Mad" also contains a description of "FOX TROT No.2 (as danced by Mr Fox)". In addition, there is a musical composition by Lew Pollock from 1918 entitled the "Harry Fox Trot". The cover for the sheet music bears an image of Harry Fox with the inscribed signature "Sincerely, Harry Fox". Likewise, a Canadian newspaper reported in 1923: "The fox-trot was first danced in this country in 1914 … It is said that a well-known music-hall artist, named Harry Fox, gave a burlesque of a couple attempting a one-step to an orchestra playing 4 – 4 time. The gyrations so tickled the audience that on leaving the theatre many of them practiced the step, which at once caught on and was dubbed the fox-trot". Professional dance instructor Oscar Duryea later claimed credit for adapting Fox's routine and teaching it to the general public. According to his recollection of events: "'In 1913 – give or take a year – Harry Fox, a comedian, was doing 'hot' trotting dance steps to a popular Ragtime song in a Ziegfeld Follies at the New Amsterdam Theatre in New York. … The theatre management, wishing to capitalize on Fox's trot hit, engaged the author of this story (Oscar Duryea) to introduce the dance at the Midnight Frolic, at the night club on the roof garden, atop the theatre.… I was asked to dance with the pony ballet girls from the theatre, who were scattered among the patrons sitting at the tables. We were told, the girls and myself, to run around, in dance position, with little trotting steps, to lively four-four time music…Everytime we danced, I asked the customers to join in and dance the same steps. After running around, turning this way and that,… with maybe the twelfth or thirteenth girl, I remembered I was tired, … I said to the girl I was then … dancing with, 'Let's do some of this in half time, even if they cut our pay in half.' 'Sure', she whispered, 'it's too fast for these tired business men anyway.' … That's the way Fox Trot was born …. the customers liked it that way. When they, too, got tired running, they slowed down and walked a few'."Duryea went on to claim that, in the summer of 1914, he taught the new Fox Trot at the convention of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing in London, who liked the dance so much that they engaged him for the remainder of the week for further instruction.

Although Duryea's description purports to be a first person account, it was written over 35 years after the event, and some of its details are inconsistent with contemporary news reports. The fox trot came into public view in 1914, not 1913; Harry Fox was at the time performing during intermission between cinema films at the New York Theatre (originally the Olympia Theatre), not with Ziegfeld's Follies at the New Amsterdam Theatre;      and the nightclub on its roof was known as the Jardin de Danse or simply as the New York Roof, although some of the activities in the nightclub were occasionally described as a "midnight frolic". Harry Fox is not listed as a member of the opening-night cast of the Follies for either 1912 at the Moulin Rouge (as the New York Theatre was then called), nor for either 1913 or 1914 at the New Amsterdam Theatre, and does not  appear in newspaper advertisements for the Follies in those years. There was indeed a famous Midnight Frolic as part of the Follies at the New Amsterdam Theatre, but it did not open until January 1915, half a year after introduction of the Fox Trot. However, newspaper and magazine notices and advertisements do confirm that Duryea attended the annual congress of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing in London, which had been held on July 27-28. They also confirm that he was teaching a hybrid of the "Fox Trot" and the "Lulu Fado", called the "Duryea Fado", at his studio by mid-August 1914, immediately after "his return from Europe". Stephenson and Iaccarino thus accept Duryea's identification of Harry Fox's routine as the inspiration for the Foxtrot, but place the events in 1914 at the New York Theatre. However, some versions of the urban legend continue to uncritically repeat the questionable association with Ziegfeld's Follies.

Other Attributions
A 1914 newspaper article by dance instructor F. B. Conklin of Cleveland, Ohio attributes the foxtrot to a different pair of dancers named "Fox", a Mr. and Mrs. R. N. Fox. They reportedly brought the dance to the US from Trouville, France, and demonstrated it on Long Island. St. Louis dance instructor Jacob Mahler also noted in newspaper articles from 1914 that the dance had been brought to the US from Trouville, France, and that it had originally been known as the "Trouville Trot", but makes no mention of a "Fox". Neither claims to have been a first-hand account.

Still other newspaper articles from 1914 attribute creation of the dance to dancers Billy Kent and Jeanette Warner. One of the earliest references to the foxtrot, an article in the New York Clipper from July 18, proclaimed in its headline, "Kent and Warner Originate a New Dance, the 'Fox Trot'". Sheet music for the "Carolina Fox Trot", also published in 1914, attributes its choreography to Billy Kent and Jeanette Warner. It was reportedly composed in their honor and scheduled for release the week following their announcement of the new dance.

A 1914 instructional pamphlet by dancer and dance teacher Joan Sawyer claims that it was she who invented the foxtrot. According to this instructional pamphlet, she developed the dance at her night-club (the Persian Garden) in New York, and had featured the "trot" in her "professional stage work, even before the dance was given the name of Fox Trot". A syndicated newspaper article from October 1914 attributes to her "Congo Trot", which is "the king of the Fox Trots". A newspaper article the following year also attributed the foxtrot to her. In Joan Sawyer's instructional pamphlet, she refers to the slow steps using equestrian terminology as "walks" and to the fast steps as "trots". In equestrian terminology "fox trot" refers to a horse's gait that alternates between walks and trots, and dance historian Nick Enge surmises this to have been the source for the name of the dance.

Several early sources credit African American dancers as the inspiration for the foxtrot. Charles J. Coll, writing originally in 1919, reported that Vernon Castle observed the members of a "certain exclusive colored club" "dancing the Fox Trot, even at that time so-called, and became enthusiastic over it." However, in Vernon Castle's own description of the foxtrot, he attributes only one particular variant of the basic step to African American inspiration: "This drag is a very old negro step, often called 'Get over, Sal'." The movement so described is, in fact, similar to the triple step chassé from the Lindy Hop.

W. C. Handy ("Father of the Blues") claims in his autobiography that his "The Memphis Blues" was the inspiration for the foxtrot. During breaks from the fast-paced Castle Walk and One-step, Vernon and Irene Castle's music director, James Reese Europe, would slowly play the Memphis Blues. The Castles were intrigued by the rhythm, and Jim asked why they didn't create a slow dance to go with it. The Castles introduced what they then called the "Bunny Hug" in a magazine article. Shortly after, they went abroad and, in mid-ocean, sent a wireless to the magazine to change the name of the dance from "Bunny Hug" to the "Foxtrot." (There was indeed an "animal dance" called the "Bunny Hug", but it long predated the foxtrot and continued alongside it).

Early Spread
Regardless of its origin, the foxtrot spread quickly during the autumn of 1914. In New York, the Castle House began teaching the "Fox Trot" by July 25. On July 28, Billy Kent and Jeanette Warner demonstrated the dance at the Forrest Theatre in Philadelphia.

At the beginning of September, 1914, a conference of dance instructors in Pittsburgh proclaimed the 'fox trot' from New York to be the latest in dance movements. Instructors returning from this conference brought the foxtrot to communities in the mid-West, such as Mansfield, Ohio. Clendenen was offering classes in foxtrot in St. Louis by Sept. 8, and Vaudeville artists Humes & Hellen demonstrated the foxtrot there in mid-September. Classes in "Fox Trot" were available in Wichita, Kansas by Sept. 10. The new dance reached the West coast just as rapidly; it reached Los Angeles, CA in early September; and Oakland and San Francisco by mid-month.

There was a flurry of musical compositions containing "fox trot" in their name, or purporting to be suitable for dancing the "fox trot", some of which were recorded and distributed by Victor Records and/or Columbia records. Instructions by Vernon and Irene Castle as to how to dance the "Fox Trot" appeared in newspaper and magazine articles and in newspaper advertisements and other promotional materials for Victor Records. Likewise, promotional materials for Columbia records carried instructions and/or endorsements by Joan Sawyer.

Foxtrot competitions also began almost immediately. For example, newspapers report a competition in Scranton, PA on Aug. 24, 2014, in Brooklyn on Sept. 5, 2014, and in Philadelphia on Oct. 31.

Subsequent Development in the US
The ragtime music of the early 20th century developed during and after WW I into the jazz and swing music of the 1920s and 30s, and Foxtrot was adapted to the new music. A new dance instructor, Arthur Murray, rose to prominence in the US, and played a large role in developing and standardizing the foxtrot. These developments ultimately led to the American Social Foxtrot of today.

From the late 1910s through the 1940s, the foxtrot was the most popular fast dance, and the vast majority of dance records issued during these years were foxtrots. The waltz and tango, while popular, never overtook the foxtrot. Even the popularity of the Lindy hop in the 1940s did not affect the foxtrot's popularity, since both could be danced to the same music. Foxtrot dancers would circle around the sides of the ballroom, while Lindy Hop dancers congregated in its center.

As was to happen in England as well, the foxtrot split into slow and fast versions. In the United States, the foxtrot continued to be called just the "foxtrot", while the faster version became known as the peabody. However, the peabody was eventually supplanted, even in the United States, by the fast English version of the foxtrot, known as the quickstep.

Arthur Murray introduced his "magic step" (which he originally called the "collegiate swing") into foxtrot by 1937, when he described it in print. This significantly changed the musical phrasing of the foxtrot, for this figure and its variants employed the rhythm slow-slow-quick-quick (SSQQ). Hence, it extended across one and a half measures of music, rather than across an even number of measures as had most previous steps. This "magic step" replaced the original foxtrot basic, and went on to become the basic movement of the American-style social foxtrot still in use today. The same work also described the "promenade" (then called the "Westchester" and "Conversation Step"), which employed the same SSQQ rhythm. He described the "magic step" with right and left quarter turns and their combination as the quarter-turns or zig-zag (originally called the "Senior Walk") in 1947. These are all common 6-count figures of the American social foxtrot used today. The "magic step" with right and left quarter turns also resemble the quarter turns and chasse used in International style "quickstep", although the figures are parsed differently.

From the start, Foxtrot mixed the basic foxtrot step with figures borrowed from other dances. The most relevant of these to future developments were the figures borrowed from the waltz, with their rhythm modified to slow-quick-quick (SQQ). Some of these borrowings from the waltz are already described in the revised edition of Coll's instructional manual and in Arthur Murray's advanced correspondence course in Foxtrot, both from 1922. Murray noted at the time that "The Waltz steps to Fox Trot music are the most popular steps used by advanced dancers." This slow-quick-quick rhythm was to become an essential element of the foxtrot in future years. Arthur Murray's "How to Become a Good Dancer" from 1938 (and subsequent editions) included instructions on how to dance the waltz to foxtrot music. A list of the "20 Most Popular Steps at Arthur Murray's" from 1945 in the collection of Nick Enge includes many of the waltz steps still used in American social foxtrot today, including the box step (then the "Waltz to Fox Trot Music"), the left and right box turns ("left and right Waltz turns"), the "Balance Steps", and the "Single Twinkle".

At the same time as foxtrot was developing as a social dance, it was also developing as a theatrical dance. The introduction of full-length sound film led to a new genre of cinematography, the musical film, beginning with "The Jazz Singer" in 1927. The foxtrot in musical films is inextricably linked to Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, although they made only ten films together. One of their first films together, "Top Hat" (1935), includes the foxtrot "Dancing Cheek to Cheek". At the start of the piece, they are seen dancing American social foxtrot with each other, including a figure identical to Murray's "magic step". Later in the piece they switch into the more theatrical form known today as American Continuity-Style Foxtrot.

When rock and roll first emerged in the early 1950s, record companies were uncertain as to what style of dance would be most applicable to the music. Notably, Decca Records initially labeled its rock and roll releases as "foxtrots", most notably "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley and His Comets. Since that recording, by some estimates, went on to sell more than 25 million copies, "Rock Around the Clock" could be considered the biggest-selling "foxtrot" of all time. Today, the dance is customarily accompanied by the same big band music to which swing is also danced.

Import to England
The Foxtrot was brought to England during World War I. There, it developed largely independently of the American version into the "International Foxtrot" and "Quickstep" of today.

Oscar Duryea later claimed to have introduced the dance to England at a convention of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing (ISTD) in summer 1914, almost immediately after the dance came to prominence in New York. Newspaper and magazine notices confirm that Duryea attended this convention, which had been held on July 27-28, but make no mention of the foxtrot.

British newspaper references to the "Fox Trot" as a "New American Dance" begin by September 1914, and an article about the new American dances appeared in the November issue of Dancing Times. By January 1915 at least one English instructor and her assistants were offering classes in the Castle's version of Foxtrot. Newspaper references to the "Fox Trot" increase significantly in March-April 1915, and then explode in September-October.

In 1920, Philip J S Richardson O.B.E. (editor of the Dancing Times magazine) called the first of several "informal conferences" to establish standards for ballroom dancing. These conferences led to the issuance of a report in 1921 establishing the basic forms for One-Step, Foxtrot, Waltz and Tango.

In 1922 Victor Silvester and Phyllis Clarke became the first couple to win a world ballroom dance championship in a multi-dance competition that included foxtrot. Then, in 1924, American amateur dancer G. K. Anderson went to England and teamed up with British professional dancer Josephine Bradley in a series of dance contests. They first won a competition at the Embassy Club in Regent Street, and then went on to win the Daily Sketch Foxtrot competition. In the 1924 World Championship at the Queen's Hall, the couple won again, to become the first World Foxtrot Champions. Maxwell Stewart & Barbara Miles won the overall world ballroom dance championship that year, in a multi-dance competition which again included foxtrot.

Josephine Bradley subsequently played a huge role in the development and codification of the International style ballroom dances, including the Foxtrot. In 1924, the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing (ISTD) asked her to join a working group to codify the ballroom dances and develop a syllabus for teachers. The ISTD formed its Ballroom Branch with Bradley, Eve Tynegate Smith, Murielle Simmons, Cynthia Humphreys and Victor Silvester as founding members. Bradley continued to serve as Chairman of the ISTD Ballroom Branch from 1924–1947. . The "Great Conference" of British professional dancers, held in London in 1929, established a uniform standard.

One of the first English descriptions of foxtrot, from 1920, still closely resembles the original American version. It has four walking steps followed by four running steps alternating with other figures. However, Maxwell Stewart's description of the Foxtrot from 1932 is already recognizable as the modern "International Foxtrot", both in its terminology and figures. These include the "Three Step", the "Feather Step", the "Natural" and "Reverse Turn", the "Reverse Wave", and the "Telemark". Sir Alex Moore' s compendium Ballroom Dancing (1936) provided the standard definition of the International Foxtrot, and together with its successive revisions forms the basis of the ISTD syllabus in use today.

In England, the foxtrot split into slow and quick versions, originally referred to as the "Slow Foxtrot" ("Slowfox") and the "Quicktime Foxtrot" (now "Quickstep"). This split began by 1924 and became official at the "Great Conference" of 1929, which established 38-42 measures per minute as the preferred tempo for Foxtrot and a much faster 54-56 mpm for "Quickstep". The separation from the Quickstep allowed the slow foxtrot to slow even further. The rhythm thus decreased from 46-48 measures per minute in 1928 to 38-42 mpm in 1929, and has decreased still further to around 30 mpm today (120 beats per minute) today.