Montferina is one of the alternative names of the Nebbiolo grape that gives us Barolo and Barbaresco wines from the north-western Italian region of Piedmont that borders Switzerland. The dance, a 32-bar jig, has the same origins but travelled widely: for example, a Monfrina appears in Goulding’s Twenty Four Country Dances for the Year 1808 “With proper Tune & Directions to each Dance (as they may be performed) at Court, Bath, and all Public Assemblys” [1].

For Revuz, the Montferine is a traditional Swiss dance to a polka step and it appears twice in the notebook, following the Lauterbach both times: traditional dances from Switzerland’s neighbours to north and south. Violet Alford sums up her 1939 experience of traditional dance from the Canton de Vaud (bordering the Canton de Genève):

“Canton Vaud does sometimes show Swiss culture grafted on the imported French. The costume of this canton is entirely Alpine in character, the wide straw hats with their curious knobs on the crown, their bunches of artificial grapes, the white sleeves and colored bodices, the waistcoats of the men – all is Alpine, not French. These people dance a Monferrine, variants of which are known all along the southern Alps; but their songs are poor, often often versions of German-Swiss airs with French words; too often by far are the compositions of Jaques-Dalcroze treated as traditional songs.” [2]

1. http://petrucci.mus.auth.gr/imglnks/usimg/7/7e/IMSLP351864-PMLP71783-goulding_24_dances_1808.pdf
2. V. Alford, The Musical Quarterly, 27(4) 500-513 (1941)