What is "polka-mazurka"

n. 1 A dance that is musically similar to a mazurka, but which is danced more like a polka. 2 A dance tune in slow triple time, accented on the last beat.

The polka-mazurek is a dance, musically similar to the mazurek, but danced much like the polka. Many polka-mazureks were composed by Johann Strauss II and his family. Johann Strauss I did not compose any of this type of music; the first polka-mazurek example written by the Strauss family was in the year 1854 by Johann Strauss II, entitled La Viennoise op. 144.

The polka-mazurek was not credited to the Strauss family alone, as many Viennese composers in the 1850s era also wrote many examples. This variant of the polka was seen as cross-cultural, as many of its influences can be seen in the French-polka with its feminine and deliberate steps as well as the exciting schnell-polka, where Eduard Strauss composed many famous pieces of this type.