Annotation:Visite (La)

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VISITE, LA (The Visit). English, Country Dance or Polka. C Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. A melody by this title was first printed in James Stewart's A Select Collection of Scots English Irish and Foreign Airs Jiggs & Marches (Edinburgh, c. 1788, p. 118), however it is a different tune that then one given here. The present "La Visite" appeared first in Samuel, Ann and Peter Thompson's Twenty Four Country Dances for the Year 1789, (1789, p. 8), and in London publisher Thomas Cahusac's Compleat Tutor for the German Flute (1792), followed by a printing in Glasgow publisher James Aird's Aird's 6th and Last Volume of Scotch English, Irish and Foreign Airs adapted for the Fife, Violin, or German-Flute (1803). In America it was published in Joshua Cushing's The Fifer's Companion No. 1 (Salem, Mass., 1805).

Manuscript versions can be found in the Joseph Kershaw manuscript (where it appears as "The Visit"; a fiddler who lived in Slackcote, Saddleworth, North West England, in the 19th century, and his manuscript dates from around 1820 onwards. As "La Visit" it was included in the c. 1800-1802 music manuscript collection of ship's fiddler William Litten.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Aird (Aird's 6th and Last Volume of Scotch English, Irish and Foreign Airs adapted for the Fife, Violin, or German-Flute), 1803; No. 87, p. 34. The Joseph Kershaw Manuscript, 1993; No. 4. Thompson (24 Country Dances for the Year 1789), 1789; p. 8.

Recorded sources:

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