BALLROOM and ballet, tango and tap – the huge variety of dance has evolved down through history.

Dance has been associated with tradition, ritual, celebration, entertainment and expression down the ages.

Today we look at some of the adults and youngsters who have stepped out to perform their own particular dance routines in East Lancashire.

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Modern popular dance music initially emerged from late 19th century’s Western ballroom and social dance music.

During the early 1900s, ballroom dancing gained popularity among the working class who flocked to local public dance halls.

By the age of the flapper in the 1920s, dance music had became enormously popular.

Nightclubs were frequented by large numbers of people at which a form of jazz, which was characterised by fancy orchestras with stringed instruments and complex arrangements, became the standard music at clubs.

The 1930s, however, is remembered as the Swing era, when swing music was at its height.

Many will remember the dance halls of the ‘40s and ‘50s, though they began to lose ground in the 1960s as rock and roll was becoming the the popular form of dance among the teenagers.

The rise of disco in the early 1970s led to dance music becoming popular with the public.

Here are some East Lancashire folk who have enjoyed and entertained with their own routines over the last decades.

Rock and roll arrived at a time of considerable technological change, soon after the development of the electric guitar and the 45 rpm record.

Because the development of rock and roll was an evolutionary process, no single record can be identified as unambiguously “the first” rock and roll record.

Bill Haley’s ‘Rock around the Clock’, recorded in April 1954, was not a commercial success until the following year, and is generally recognised as an important milestone.

Morris dancing is far removed from rock’n’roll , with a history going back centuries.

The earliest known and surviving English written mention of Morris dance is dated to 1448, and records the payment of seven shillings to Morris dancers by the Goldsmiths’ Company in London.

While the earliest references place the Morris dance in a courtly setting, it appears that it became part of performances for country dwelling folk by the later 16th century.

By the mid 17th century, the peasantry took part in Morris dances, especially at Whitsun, though the Puritan Government of Oliver Cromwell suppressed the festival of Whitsun Ales.

s and other such celebrations.

Morris dancing continued in popularity until the industrial revolution and its accompanying social changes, though in the latter part of the 20th century and today, groups are reviving the age –old tradition.