The title of this dance is taken from the first line of the accompanying song, meaning “As it happened, on the thawed earth.” It is a traditional dance song from the Ural region. The dance, a so-called parnaya plyaska (plyaska meaning “dance,” and parnaya “in couples”) was choreographed by Hennie Konings and is an example of basic elements of the Russian folk dance school. It was first presented in Langnau, Switzerland, in 2010. The typical “walking steps over the heel” during meas 1-2 of Figure I are thought to originate from the city quadrille dancing, where town folks wearing modern heeled shoes liked to focus the attention to this piece of contemporary costume, making full use of the possibilities these shoes with heels were giving over old-fashioned leather sandals. Tatyana Ustinova, former choreographer of the Pyatnitskiy Folk Ensemble, developed an academic style of staged folk dancing, and she often made use of this particular step.

Presented by Radboud Koop in 2010. View pdf here.