Allemande

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An allemande (spelt allemanda in Italian), is a dance that was popular in Baroque music in the 17th and early 18th centuries. The word comes from the French word for "German".

Composers of the Baroque period often composed a group of several dances. This was called a suite. There was usually an allemande, a courante, a sarabande and a gigue, in that order, and sometimes one or two other dances or as well. Sometimes a suite started with a prelude (an introductory movement) before the allemande.

The allemande was played at a moderate speed - not too fast, not too slow. There were 4 beats in a bar (4/4 time), and it started with an anacrusis (an upbeat, i.e. one, or possibly a small group of notes which were not on the first beat of a bar).