Piano party

In addition to considerable work destined to bring the waltz into the drawing-rooms and the quadrille into the grand balls, the Romantic composers often appropriated popular or entertaining forms to evoke the memory of past centuries or the exoticism of a fanaticised elsewhere in the more intimate works, especially those intended for piano. Like the cicada of La Fontaine’s story – condemned to dancing for not having foreseen its future – waltzes, bourrées, jigs and mazurkas were the last refuges for suspending time in a world transformed by the industrial revolution.