An authentic Polish folk dance is one of the most joyful and arresting spectacles a tourist can witness in Poland. These dances are performed all over Poland, but the first step in fully appreciating the experience is to learn more about these wonderfully preserved local traditions.

In fact, there is no such thing as a Polish folk dance. Every dance is rooted in a particular region, and is accordingly treasured by its inhabitants as a part of local, rather than national, culture. In order to learn more about the dances you are bound to encounter, simply select the touristic profile which appeals to you the most and discover the colourful particulars of the region.

I’m on a ski trip in the mountains, and we’re staying in Zakopane.

Can’t go wrong with classics: Kraków all the way!

I’m in Germany, I might as well hop on the other side of the border and check out Poznań…

Going to Bydz..Bygdoz…Bydgoszcz.

I have friends in Warsaw, and my friends have relatives outside of Warsaw.

I’m nowhere near Poland, isn’t there a dance that would sum it all up?

Podhale

How can you tell that you're in the Polish Podhale region? If you see a bunch of highlanders in woollen trousers doing crazy crouches, somersaults and air kicks, you'll know you're in the Polish highlands – the southernmost part of Poland called Podhale. The most typical regional dance is called the krzesane. These dance acrobats don't need stages or dance studios – they perform wherever, outdoors, on rocks, high up in the mountains (the closer to the peak the better), in meadows or in a crowded room. Their only equipment: bagpipes, gusles and a shepherd's walking stick-cum-axe called a ciupaga. They say that highlanders have music in their veins and feet made for dancing. Polish playwright, novelist, painter and philosopher Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz wrote that nothing could be compared to the "strength, passion and ferocity of this romance expressed through dance". Tatra mountains and Zakopane expert Tytus Chałubiński put it like this:

There is an element of possession in this dance. It expresses savageness and the primitive with so much flair, fantasy and energy! What are the dancers doing? They're walking around in a circle, faster and faster, the rhythm speeds up, the music is hung on the chords by a thin screech. The ringleader, who stands in the middle, is spinning around his ciupaga. His rhythm is different to that of the others. When the shepherd’s apprentice whistles with his fingers everyone stops. Three couples form and they begin to jump. They stretch out their hands while holding sticks. This perhaps illustrates a fight. And again. They're back in the first position walking one behind the other but this time even faster. One at a time they jump into the air. They start to close the circle, the music is as fast as it can be. The shepherd’s apprentice encircles the ringleader who picks up his ciupaga and jerks it in the air. The apprentices sit down and extend their sticks towards the ciupaga. Out of nowhere the music stops and so does the circle of dancers.

The history of the traditional dances of the Podhale region goes back five centuries. Chałubiński described the zbójnicki dance (loosely translated as bandit's dance), a very masculine war dance that imitates a fight with an enemy and the defence of one's herd. By contrast, a typical highlander's dance is zealous and passionate with a love plot. The dancers twirl and spin their female dance partners. Krzesany – the mid-air heel-clicking mentioned before – is part of the highlander's dance. How do they do it? Beginners are told to imagine they are rubbing two stones together to start a fire.

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Kraków

Typical Kraków dances first developed in the suburban parts of the city and then spread to the nobility and theatres. The fast, syncopated Polish dance in duple time has a number of names: mijany (to pass by), przebiegany (to run past), suwany (to drag your feet) or dreptany (to toddle). It was initiated by a song to which the ballroom guests would first walk and then gallop. The galloping was accompanied by numerous bows, waving and foot stomping. An integral part of the krakowiak, as the dance is known, is the mid-air foot clicking move called a hołubiec.



The krakowiak is one of five best-known national dances and it was named after an opera called Krakowiacy i górale (Cracoviennes and Highlanders) performed at the National Theatre in Warsaw on March 1st, 1794.