metelica

The tradition & historical record

Metelitsa (Russian: метелица), metelytsia (Ukrainian: мeтeлиця) or miacielica (Belarusian: мяцеліца, завейніца) is a popular folk dance from Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. This dance abounds in swift changes of choreographed figures of a spinning nature, symbolizing a snowstorm. The dance still retains its Khorovod character, the ancient form of group dancing and choral singing with the many figures in a circle form. In the past the Metelystia was danced to only choral accompaniment. In the late 19th and early 20th century besides singing the song, it was accompanied by the violin or sometimes an instrumental ensemble. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Metelitsa”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

metelica is East Slavic folk dance, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 2 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²