Listening to the 1978 Topic album “Memories of Sligo” by Tommy Healy and Johnny Duffy, and the track “The First Part of the Lancers” specifically, my attention was drawn to the sleevenotes by Reg Hall:
“The first Part of The Lancers, an untitled piece, was readily recalled when Johnny and Tommy were asked to play something old-fashioned and out of the ordinary and it is one of the very few Irish traditional dance tunes that can be pinned down to a non-traditional, composed origin. It derives from the first two parts of La Dorset, written around 1817 by Spagnoletti, leader of the orchestra of the King’s Theatre, London and published as figure 1 of the Original Lancers’ Quadrille. Johnny and Tommy have reversed the order of the first part and the turn”
This reminded me that a couple of months ago, digging through a pile of tatty sheet music in a Plymouth junkshop, I found an 1817 copy of the original source for this, “The Lancers quadrilles, or Duval of Dublin’s second set“. It cost me 50p. Knowing from the junkshop owner that most of their wares come from a reclamation deal they have with the Plymouth tip, and that I almost never bother to look through sheet music, I can’t help marvelling how lucky I was to find this.
Here’s a scan of my copy of La Dorset complete with dance instructions in French and English
