 |
The combination of music and horses is always a crowd pleaser. The most popular event of today's large dressage shows nowadays has to be the dressage Musical Freestyle, or Kur. The performances of the Spanish Riding School are ridden to musical accompaniment, as are the Musical Rides of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Up until 1986, the dressage Musical Freestyle was little known. In 1986, the Dressage World Cup was established and the scores for the championship were divided 50/50 between the Grand Prix and the Kur (freestyle). Since that time, the popularity of the freestyle has grown tremendously and in 1996 it was added, for the first time, to the Olympic Dressage competition in the Atlanta Games. The highlight of the annual Belvoir Hill Christmas Potluck Pageant (aside from the food!) has to be the musical ride, or quadrille.
Students of all riding levels practice hard to perfect their precision synchronized riding program, which is expertly choreographed to music.
The end result is a highly entertaining show that is as much fun to watch as it is to perform.
|
