This is a highlander song that is usually associated with the Polish dance known as the Trojak The lyrics describe a neighbor who has many daughters helping with sowing grain seed in his fields. One wonders why these women never married. Perhaps it is because they are quarrelsome and/or poor housekeepers.
Trojak ("threesome", "trio", in Polish) is a Silesian folk dance. It is a double partner dance and performed in groups of three: one male dancer and two female dancers. The music of the dance has two parts: a slow one in 3/4 metre and a fast one in 2/4 metre. These parts are repeated several times, one after another.
Ignoring the footwork, the figures may have the following arrangements:
All three move in sync from the same foot.
The boy dances with one girl, the second one dancing alone, then the boy switches the girl.
Girls are rolling on and then rolling off the arms.
The trio forms a circle
The boy and the girls separate and move in the opposite directions, then join again.
Here are some examples:
Polonez performing a Trojak for a Polish Day celebration at Balboa Park in San Diego
Polish folk music was collected in the 19th century by Oskar Kolberg, as part of a wave of Polish national revival. With the coming of the world wars and then the Communist state, folk traditions were oppressed or subsumed into state-approved folk ensembles. The most famous of the state ensembles are Mazowsze and Śląsk, both of which still perform. Though these bands had a regional touch to their output, the overall sound was a homogenized mixture of Polish styles. There were more authentic state-supported groups, such as Słowianki, but the Communist sanitized image of folk music made the whole field seem unhip to young audiences, and many traditions dwindled rapidly.
Polish dance music, especially the mazurka and polonaise, were popularized by Frederick Chopin, and they soon spread across Europe and elsewhere. These are triple time dances, while five-beat forms are more common in the northeast and duple-time dances like the krakowiak come from the south. The polonaise comes from the French word for Polish to identify its origin among the Polish aristocracy, who had adapted the dance from a slower walking dance called chodzony. The polonaise then re-entered the scene and became an integral part of Polish music.
Poland's five national dances
(Mazur, Polonez, Kujawiak, Krakowiak, Oberek), as well as modern dance, contemporary dance and ballet are all widely performed today throughout the Polonia community.