Black Nag: A Song History

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"The Black Nag" is an English country dance and tune from John Playford's long-running Dancing Master, but sources disagree about which edition introduced it. An incipit index hosted by the Country Dance and Song Society, Early American Secular Music and Its European Sources, 1589-1839, finds "Black Nagg" in the third edition of 1657 (and its 1665 issue), and again from the fourth edition of 1670 onward[1]; the Traditional Tune Archive likewise dates its first appearance to the 1657 third edition, as a new tune[2]. Cecil Sharp's version of the dance, by contrast, is headed "4th Ed. 1670"[3], and the Society of Folk Dance Historians states that the dance was first described in that 1670 edition[4]. The Tune Archive adds that Walsh's Compleat Country Dancing Master reprinted the melody as "The Galloping Nag" in 1718, that John and William Neal published it in Dublin in 1726, and that its dance and tune resemble "Millison's Jegge" from Playford's first edition of 1651[2].

Théodore Géricault lithograph of a black horse with a checked blanket tethered in a stable

Théodore Géricault, Black Horse Tethered in a Stable, lithograph, 1822. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Public domain (CC0). Shown for its black horse; it has no connection to the dance.

Sharp published his interpretation of the dance in The Country Dance Book, Part II, first published in 1911[5]. He set it as a longways dance for six, that is, three couples, in three parts, built from leading up and back, slipping couple by couple up and down the set, siding, changing places, arming, and a hey for each line[3]. In his introduction he singled out "The Black Nag" as one of several fine Playford melodies that, as far as he was aware, no accessible modern edition had yet printed[3].

The Tune Archive calls the Playford printing an early version of the jig and catalogues the version found in later tune books separately: a 6/8 jig, set in D minor or A minor depending on the book, and played AABB in most versions (ABB in Sharp)[6]; Jeremy Barlow's 1985 transcription of the Playford version, by contrast, reads it in the major[2]. The Tune Archive describes it as still popular with English country dancers and as a three-couple set dance in American contra circles, and the recordings it lists include the Fennigs All Star String Band's The Hammered Dulcimer Strikes Again on Front Hall[6]. The Society of Folk Dance Historians observes that, as a single run-through is brief, some groups dance it three times in all, letting each couple lead once[4].

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Sources

  1. Country Dance and Song Society: "Early American Secular Music and Its European Sources, 1589-1839: Incipit Index: BLA".
  2. Traditional Tune Archive: "Black Nag (1) (The)".
  3. Library of Dance: "The Country Dance Book, Part II" (Cecil J. Sharp, 2nd ed., 1913).
  4. Society of Folk Dance Historians: "Black Nag".
  5. The Round (Cambridge University English Country Dance Club): "The Country Dance Book".
  6. Traditional Tune Archive: "Black Nag (2) (The)".