Sancho’s Dance Mix - Julian Grant (1960-)
A suite on dance tunes by Ignatius Sancho (c. 1729-1780)
1. Many Minuets
2. Air
3. Who’d a’ thought it: Reeling on Richmond Hill with Marianne

Julian Grant's composition is based on Sancho’s ‘Minuets &c. &c. for the Violin, Mandolin, German-flute and Harpsichord. Compos'd by an African. Book 2nd. Humbly Inscribed to the Right Honble. John Lord Montagu of Boughton’. (London, c 1770)

Ignatius Sancho arrived in Britain from Africa as a very young child slave and was rescued from a life of servitude by the enlightened John, second Duke of Montagu, who helped educate him. He became popular in fashionable London society and was painted by Gainsborough. Bequests from the Montagu family enabled Sancho to publish his music and to establish a grocery shop close to the Montagu mansion in London. He was the first British African to vote, to own a shop, to have his own music, letters and memoirs published, and the first African to have an obituary in the British press. Through his accomplished, witty and well-informed letters, which also highlighted the immorality of the slave trade, Sancho's life became an important symbol of the humanity of Africans. He left a legacy of four volumes of music – a set of songs and three sets of dances. (Programme note by Paul Boucher, who most generously commissioned this work for the Buskaid Ensemble.)

Composer’s note : The second book of Minuets &c. &c. by Ignatius Sancho consists of 11 minuets, an air and a few assorted jigs, reels and a hornpipe. The first movement of this adaptation strings together five minuets, and there is a tiny snatch of Sancho’s original Minuet no 5 in G major - just a melody and a bass line - at one point. The central Air is an almost straight transcription, and the finale weaves together Marianne’s Reel, Richmond Hill (a jig) and Who’d a’thought it? (a reel) into a drunken and exuberant counterpoint. (Julian Grant)

The Buskaid Music School is situated in Diepkloof Soweto, and offers high quality string tuition to the local, less privileged community. In 2022 it celebrates its 25th Anniversary.

www.buskaid.org.za

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