Annotation:Spring Garden (2)
X: 1 T:Spring Garden [2]. (p)1657.PLFD1.132 M:6/4 L:1/4 Q:3/4=100 B:Playford, Dancing Master,3rd Ed.,1657 O:England;London H:1657. Z:Chris Partington <www.cpartington.plus> K:Am A2 A c2 c|d>eda3|A3 c3|d>ed ^c A2:| |:f2 f g>fe|f a2 g2 e|f2 f g>fe|f a2 g2 e| fga g>fe|ded fga| A3 c3|d>ed ^cA2:|
SPRING GARDEN [2]. English, Country Dance Tune (6/8 time). A Minor/Mixolydian. Standard tuning (fiddle). ABB (Sharp): ABBB (Barnes). The melody with directions for a country dance was first published by John Playford in his Dancing Master, 3rd editor (1657). It was retained in the remainder of the edition of the long-running Dancing Master series, through the 18th and final edition of 1728 (then published by John Young, heir to the Playford publishing concerns). It was also printed by rival London music publisher John Walsh in his Compleat Country Dancing Master, editions of 1718, 1731 and 1754, and in his Compleat Country Dancing Master, Volume the Fourth (1740).
The London area called Spring Garden was probably formed in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, located in the north-east corner of St. James's Park as an addition to the pleasure grounds of Whitehall Palace. One meaning of spring, was "a plantation of young trees, especially one inclosed and used for rearing and harbouring game"[1] and it seems probable that it was in this sense that the Spring Garden was first so called. The garden had become a semi-public pleasure ground before the end of James I's reign, and remained fashionableble, if at times unruly. In 1635 the garden was ordered to be closed and soon after a "new Spring Garden" was "erected in the Fields behind the Meuse." At the Restoration the "garden" ceased to be such except in name, for the greater part was divided up into plots and let on lease. Spring Garden survives today, at least in title, as the name of the little thoroughfare which lies behind the southwest frontage to Charing Cross.
- ↑ Oxford English Dictionary.