【英语时差8,16】The Cancan 康康舞（在线收听）

Do you recognise that tune? Well, it’s a famous piece of music called Orpheus in the Underworld. And it was written 150 years ago! And who better to tell us more about it than David Price, who’s written a book about it. It’s very difficult to actually identify when it started. It sorted of emerged really, around 1830. From what I can ascertain, it seemed to be men who did it first. They sort of introduced a lot more athleticism, high kicks, generally prancing about and having a good time. And soon women decided that they wanted to join in too. I guess the petticoats are the most important thing. They’re vintage, very, very vibrant, very full and we do lots of petticoat work, lots of frou-frou, as you can hear (sound of material rustling). And we have bespoke corsets and jewellery, and we all have boots obviously with red-trimmed laces. Mandy explains how she trains other girls to do those high-kicks. We use balloons. We start off with somebody holding a balloon and somebody else kicking. And we raise, and raise and raise. And then we give the girls homework to tie the balloon in a doorway. And kick and kick and kick until they can remove the balloon. And if you thought the kicks were difficult, take a listen to this! You have to make sure you’re extremely warm and well-trained, and once you reach that edge, as long as you’re warmed up it’s not difficult. And there’s a psychological part to it. People are quite frightened. Even when you can do the splits, to run and launch yourself and jump into them is quite a psychological leap from just gently going down into the splits. So it is quite hard.