Re: the Tsakonikos dance. I had a chance to check out the videos. It's an interesting dance. The melody is not complex, in two parts- slow alternating with fast (in some versions). It's in 5/4 time. Quite interesting actually, I had a chance to check out the two volumes of Gurdjieff transcriptions by Hartmann last summer and I can almost swear that this tune or something quite similar to it was in the book. If I was going to be in town I would get them through interlibrary loan but I'm leaving for a couple of weeks and it would be of no use now....maybe when I get back.
Anyway, the interesting thing for me on this video (
, the dance is at approximately 6:15). The dancers (men and women, here alternating in order, other versions I've seen with men or women in clusters, though usually a man and woman are at the front of the line) move in a line that curves- step step step pause in the slow section, then step step step skip step. Maybe that is not clear. On beat 5 in the slow part they just step their other foot up to where the first one is, but they do not move forward until the next 1. Then in the fast section on beat 4 the foot does not actually touch the ground until beat 5, it "skips".
Towards the end in this particular version the group forms a sort of close-knit spiral, then the first couple forms a bridge with their hands/handkerchief, and the other dancers pass through underneath. Sort of reminds me of networking, which brings people closer together (as in Mouravieff's circles- exoteric, esoteric, etc.) and a polar couple serving as a guide "through" to the other side.
Unfortunately the lyrics seem not to be so esoteric:
