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Gammaldans: The word gammaldans (old-time dance) doesn`t appear until after the World War 1. The term arose because new dance forms arrived from America and Europe shortly after the turn of the century, so that the previously common Norwegian dance forms now became old (gammal). However, when viewed in a larger perspective, we would call gammaldans a new tradition because it appeared during a recent musical cultural epoch that more or less paralleled the industrial revolution. When people moved from the country to the city in order to work in industry, the phenomenon of leisure activeties was born. Fixed working hours made room for consideral social gatherings, and music and dance were natural activities in which everyone could participate. The upper class, who owned the industrial work places, also had social activities with music and dance, but here the impulses were imported wares from higher social strata in the countries of middle Europe. Many of these dances and their music are still widely used in Norway today under the name turdansar (contra line dances).
If we look more closely at the phenomenon of gammaldans, we see that it shares one of its most salient characteristics with the olde bygdedans, namely, that it is a free dance form. It seems likely that gammaldans forms first developed in the towns. They were the dances of the working class. However, developmental impulses came as much from the dance and music of the social upper classes as from bygdedans.
Little by little gammaldans found its way into all social groups in the country. The older style of music and dance (slåttemusikk and bygdedans) seemed threatened for a long time. Fiddle and Hardanger fiddle, instruments that previously had a central role, now had to compete with accordion--the leading instrument for the new dances.
With time the war for position between the two instruments abated--and today the two instruments play together in some highly developed forms in several of our gammeldans bands.
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