Annotation:Saratoga Lancers

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X:1 T:Saratoga Lancers B:Brenda Subbert's Collection of Fiddle Tunes (1992) M:C| L:1/8 K:C| D2 DF A2 FA|d2 Bd A2 FE|D/D/D ...

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SARATOGA LANCERS. Canadian, Reel (cut time). Canada, Cape Breton. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AA’BB’. The Saratoga Lancers was late 19th century variant of the Lancers dance figures. The dance was popular in the Maritimes; Ken Perlman names it along with Caledonian sets, the Prince Imperial, the Continentals, the Union Quadrille, and the Empire Quadrille as a popular square set on Prince Edward Island Robert Stubbert remembered a set called the Saratoga Lancers being danced to this tune on the wharf in Alder Point when he was a boy, according to Paul Cranford (1994). There is a "Saratoga Lancers" from the 1880's at the Library of Congress site, but it is unrelated to the Stubbert's tune. The Saratoga Lancers is mentioned in Newfoundland balladeer Johnny Burke's (1851-1930) folk song "Kelligrews Soiree":

"The Saratoga Lancers first," Miss Betsy kindly said,
I danced with Nancy Cronin and her Granny on the Head;
And Hogan danced with Betsy, well you should have seen his shoes,
As he lashed the muskets from the rack that night at Kelligrews.