Tunes from Playford's Dancing Master

Originally published in 1651 as the "English Dancing Master", this was an instruction manual for country dancing. Accompanying each dance was a tune, 105 in the first edition. "The Dancing Master" as it was known from the second edition onwards, eventually ran to 18 editions over a period of 80 years, and during that period, over 500 tunes were included. It is an invaluable source of popular music of the second half of the 17^th century and many of the tunes, especially from the earlier editions, date back to the 16^th century.

All the files were produced using Noteworthy Composer. If you would like the files in the original Noteworthy format, select download complete set as zip file.

• Black Nag. (3^rd Edition, 1657)
• Daphne. (1^st, Edition, 1651)
• Dargasson, The old mole & If all the world were paper. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Bloomsbury Market (12^th Edition, 1702)
• Heart's Ease. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Jenny pluck pears. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Childgrove. (11^th Edition, 1701)
• Iantha. (13^th Edition, 1706)
• Lady Catherine Ogle. (7^th Edition, 1687)
• Maiden Lane. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Newcastle. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Parsons farewell. 1^st Edition, 1651)
• Portsmouth. (11^th Edition, 1701)
• Stingo or Oil of Barley. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• Westmorland. (7^th Edition, 1686)
• All in a Garden Green. (1^st Edition, 1651)
• An Italian Rant. (3^rd Edition, 1657)
• Woodycock (1^st Edition, 1651) - with variations, (Anon.) from 16^th> century
• Download complete set as zip file