If you can walk, you can dance Jane Austen-style.

Set aside the TikTok dance challenges and the line dancing for an afternoon, and try on English country dancing, the style popular in the late 1700s and early 1800s. Parrish House Baroque, a Colorado Springs quartet that focuses on early music, will perform while attendees dance during their season-opening Regency Ball and reception. It’s Saturday at First Lutheran Church and The Peel House.

“All you have to do to do Regency dancing is be able to walk. It’s very accessible,” said Parrish House Baroque co-founder and artistic director Elisa Wicks. “It’s one of the only times in history where women’s clothing was more comfortable than the men’s. You’d have a long, straight gown with an empire waist and the shoes were flats. You’d tie a ribbon around the bust, put on gloves if you’re fancy, and you’ve got your Regency outfit.”

Pioneer Rodeo bringing mutton bustin', car crushin' to the Norris Penrose Event Center this weekend

Men’s dancing costumes were a bit more stuffy, requiring jackets, dress shirts, high collars and boots. Eventgoers are encouraged to dress up, but it’s not required. Dancing isn’t even required. People can sit to the side and listen and watch.

After the dancing and music, which will be held in the church’s main building, a reception with the musicians will take place inside The Peel House, a nearby home built in 1905 by the Jewett family, the same family behind the Patty Jewett Golf Course. The Giddings family, who owned the Giddings building downtown and opened the city’s first department store, were the next to inhabit the historic home. First Lutheran Church bought the home in 1958, using it as its church before constructing its main building. In 2020, the church renovated The Peel House.

Wicks and her husband, Eric Wicks, started the nonprofit ensemble in 2013 after moving to Colorado Springs and discovering there wasn’t a professional-level early-music group. The four musicians perform on historic instruments: Elisa on baroque violin, Eric on harpsichord, Jennifer Carpenter on recorder, and Pam Chaddon on baroque cello.

One word for this Colorado Springs Ghanaian restaurant: Amazing! | Dining review

The group performs half a dozen concerts throughout the year at The Peel House, with a few extra events tucked in here and there. Their second concert of the season is “Virtuoso Baroque” Sept. 27-28 at First Lutheran Church.

While they specialize in music from the Baroque period, from 1600-1750, they also dabble in Renaissance and early classical music from the late 1700s to early 1800s.

Violins have been modernized with metal strings and differently shaped bows, but the ensemble plays on gut strings and with copies of historic bows. Elisa’s violin is from 1793.

“We study not only music written then, but the way it was performed and the lives of the composers who wrote it and the performers who performed it,” Elisa said.

Comic Con returning to Colorado Springs this weekend

Carpenter, a musicologist, specializes in Renaissance, Baroque and some Medieval music, and teaches workshops around the U.S. She helps the group find historical information about their pieces. Chaddon and Elisa find lost or forgotten music and interesting connections between pieces and composers. Eric, the music director at First Lutheran Church, also is the organist in the ensemble and plays a small, portable pipe organ.

“All of the instruments have interesting parts and weave together in beautiful and creative ways,” Elisa said. “I love how the composers expected musicians to improvise and add musical ornamentation of their own. When you play later repertoire, like even Brahms, you are supposed to play what’s on the page.”