Rigaudon

The rigaudon is a French Baroque dance — a brisk duple-time piece originating in Provençal folk music that spread through the seventeenth-century French court and into the Baroque suite alongside the gavotte and bourrée. Telemann's Rigaudon on the Trinity Grade 2 list is a clean exemplar: short, four-square, and rhythmically buoyant.

The piece is in C major and tests duple-metre articulation at a comfortable tempo. Both hands stay close to a five-finger position; the right hand carries the dance line and the left hand provides a walking bass with occasional thirds. The technical demand is rhythmic clarity — the rigaudon's character lives in clearly-articulated quavers and a small lift between the dance phrases.

Two pitfalls. First, the piece often gets played as a generic Baroque romp without attention to its specific dance character — a rigaudon is faster and lighter than a gavotte but heavier than a passepied, and the difference is audible. Second, students often slur the right-hand articulation; aim for a light non-legato touch rather than full slurred legato.

Telemann's keyboard suites and dance miniatures are widely available on IMSLP. Hearing a rigaudon played on a Baroque keyboard instrument helps calibrate the right articulation weight.