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So I really want to know what exactly qualifies as a dance piece in the piano repertoire. I need to play these pieces for a competition and need two dance pieces, one before 1800 and one after 1830. Kindly let me know how I can judge that a piece is a dance piece.
Thanks

Minuets, sarabandes, courantes, gavottes, bourees and gigues are all dances and were popular prior to 1800. Look at any of Bach's French or English Suites or Suites by Handel. (There are also other Baroque dances: rigaudons, polonaises, loures etc.)

All of the Chopin Waltzes were written after 1830, so they would qualify for the second selection. So would all but one or two of the Mazurkas, which are also dances.

Just curious. There was no waltz music before 1800?

The dance itself existed before 1800, so there was obviously music written for it. I remember seeing a Waltz by Mozart somewhere in a piano anthology. Whether he named it waltz or it was originally a contredanse or German dance, I can't be sure.

I know there are people in this forum who probably know much more about this than me.

Albeniz and Granados both wrote a lot of Spanish dance music, if you are looking for something a little less overplayed.

I was under the impression that the waltz developed from the Austrian landler.

Why does a competition want two dance pieces? What length do they want?

Is this to get at minuet mvts. in Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven sonatas?

Do they allow transcriptions?

Thank you all for the replies. That is gonna help a lot.
@whodwaldi We are allowed to select any number of dances but the total duration of the set should be 6-8 min. Also, atleast one should be before 1800 and atleast one, after 1830. They do allow transcriptions and we are allowed to play extracts from relevant pieces too.

Don't forget the Latin dances - tango, samba etc. Plenty of tangos by Piazzolla in arrangements for solo piano (e.g. the well-known Libertango); there's also an easy one by Albéniz (or you can choose Godowsky's 'elaboration' of it). More Argentinian dances by Ginastera (called, appropriately, '3 Argentinian Dances' ).

As for sambas - lots by Nazareth. 'Jamaican Rumba' by Arthur Benjamin is a crowd pleaser - that tune is a real earworm. Ravel wrote a Menuet antique and a foxtrot (cinq heures from L'enfant et les sortileges). You could say that his Pavane pour une infante défunte is also a dance. (He wrote much more difficult dances as well of course, in Le tombeau de Couperin.)

And Cuban dances by Lecuona....

They seem to be excluding Schubert.

For the record, I think some Schubert selections are rather nice, such as . . .

1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 13, 14, 19, & 20 from Valses Sentimentales, Op. 50

1, 3, 9, 13, & 14 from Hommage aux belles Viennoises, Op. 67

(selections stolen without shame from a Walter Klien recording).

One could always sneak in that Schubert/Liszt Valse Caprice No. 6 that Horowitz played in Russia. But, everbody remembers Horowitz playing that in Russia!

Brahms Waltzes, Op. 39, Nos. 1, 2, 4, 6, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, & 15 (selection stolen, again, from Herr Klien).

What about something like Mozart's Duport Variations (based on a minuet)? Might be a stretch of rules.

Prokofiev wrote a number of dances, both directly for piano, or in transcription. His 10 pieces, op. 12, includes a gavotte, a rigaudon, a mazurka, and an allemande - all dances. His 4 pieces, op. 32, are all dances. Transcriptions include the gavotte from the "Classical Symphony", a gavotte (op. 77 bis) from some incidental music to Hamlet, the 3 pieces (op. 96) which are a waltz, a contredanse, and a "Mephisto-Waltz", and then several pieces from his Cinderalla ballet. I suppose all of his ballet transcriptions are technically "dance pieces", but I would check with the competition to see if they include ballet music in their definition before I used any.

Milhaud's Saudades Do Brazil is a suite of 12 Latin American dances that are about the most charming polytonal music you can find.

There are the "6 Dances in Bulgarian Rhythm" in the last book of Bartok's Mikrokosmos. He also wrote a suite called "6 Romanian Folk Dances".

There is way too much dance music to pick out just a few. If you want to try something by someone who is alive, you might try Wim Statius Muller's Antillean Dances. There was a Waltz Project from 40 years ago that Peters publishes, and I recall a Tango Project, which may not be published, but people keep writing dances, or dancing to music that people write.

Schönberg's suite for piano, op. 25, is modelled after baroque dance suite, so I guess everything except the prelude and the intermezzo would qualify.

And if you turn to Grieg, you can choose anything with the title "Halling", "Springar" and "Gangar". There are quite a few among the "Lyric Pieces" ranging in difficulty from "easy" to "unplayable". And the late opus 72 (slaatter) are mainly Norwegian folk dances arranged for the piano.

Just about anything can be choreographed...