De Waltz Zeeman (Netherlands)

De Valse Zeeman (duh VAHL-seh ZAY-mahn) was choreographed by Sibylle Helmer to a song by the same name from an album entitled Dorothea, recorded in 2000 by the Flemish group Lais. It was taught at the Folk Dance Federation of California Statewide Festival in Redding, California, by Roberto Bagnoli in May 2014. He learned it in Italy from Wijnand Karel. The name literally means the false or untruthful sailor (or seaman), but in the context of this dance can be translated as “the unfaithful sailor.” The lyrics tell about a couple’s expression of undying love for each other; the sailor then goes to sea and there are waves (Fig. II 1-4) and rocking of the boat (Fig. II 5-8). Toward the end, the sailor is unfaithful to the girl, and they both seek new partners (final Fig.III). As far as we could determine, the dance was first taught in North America by Tineke Van Geel at Pinewoods Camp (Plymouth, MA) in 2004 and at Saratoga (CA) on Nov. 20, 2004. She also wrote a dance description in English that has been widely distributed. It differs from Bagnoli’s version in one small way in Fig. II as noted below. Richard Brown (Kirkwood, NY) is shown teaching a version of the dance on youtube in 2011, and the choreographer claims that of the many videos on youtube, this one best demonstrates the dance as she created it. Richard Brown reports learning the dance from Jocelyne Vaillancourt of Montreal. We thank R. Bagnoli, R. Brown, S. Helmer, and T. Van Geel for important contributions to this description. Dance notes…