Les Lanciers

Description

Feliks Janiewicz (1762–1848) was a violinist and composer born in Vilnius who moved to Britain and made his career there. He was among the founding members of the Philharmonic Society of London and spent his last years in Edinburgh. The Lancers was a kind of quadrille, a dance for four couples facing one another, widely danced in nineteenth-century Britain and elsewhere.

It is in C major, in 4/4. As music meant for a ballroom, it is written with a regular beat and a melody in clearly marked phrases. A right-hand tune is supported beat by beat with left-hand chords, an easy texture to follow. It is a short piece of about one minute ten seconds and 334 notes, and its range from G2 to C6 fits comfortably on a 61-key keyboard.

It is rated intermediate, and the challenge is keeping the dance beat steady to the end. Changing expression from phrase to phrase while holding the tempo constant is what makes it sound like a dance. Keeping the left-hand chords short so they do not turn heavy gives it lightness. Check the beat at a reduced playback speed, practise phrase by phrase with the A-B loop, and then play it through at full speed.

A broad collection of standalone piano pieces not belonging to any specific set, offering hundreds of varied character pieces to explore and compare.