[Callers] Great dances for learning how to dance with ghosts?

[Tom Hinds]

Jim, maybe the meager response was because you didn't give an example.  And what does "the DL;TR crowd" mean?

Tom

Sent from my iPad

> On Apr 10, 2018, at 9:45 PM, jim saxe via Callers <callers at lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
> 
>> On Apr 6, 2018, at 3:49 PM, Yoyo Zhou via Callers <callers at lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
>> 
>> I recall reading something, possibly from Jim Saxe on this list (and maybe from Larry Jennings?), about how in most dances without out-of-minor-set interactions, you come back into the set ... once - after progressing to the end. But in dances like The Hobbit, where you leave the minor set once, you actually come back in to the set 3 times. ...
> 
> That would have been from me in a message to this list on July 9,
> 2014 with the subject "An observation about end effects -- becoming
> neutral three times at each end".
> 
>     https://www.mail-archive.com/callers@lists.sharedweight.net/msg07945.html
> 
> Based on the meager response at the time, I fear that few readers
> got my point (though it looks like Yoyo was one who did).  For the
> TL;DR crowd, here's the short version:
> 
>     In almost every contra with even a simple out-of-minor-set
>     action, dancers who reach the top or bottom will become
>     neutral and return to the body of the set not twice but at
>     least *THREE* different times.
> 
> I'm not going to give an example.  I think that anyone who picks
> a few examples of dances with out-of-minor-set action and actually
> takes the trouble to trace the end effects carefully will see, now
> that I've pointed it out, that what I've said is true.  And anyone
> who won't take that trouble to do that probably also wouldn't take
> the trouble to study my analysis of an example if I gave one.
> 
> In case anyone's wondering about my terminology, I won't try to
> give definitions of "out-of-minor-set action" and "neutral" that
> cover every unusual situation, but here are some remarks about
> common situations that should make my meaning clear:
> 
>    If you leave your partner to dance with a shadow and then
>    return to your partner, or if you leave a neighbor to dance
>    with a future neighbor or a previous neighbor and then return
>    to the first neighbor, I count that as an out-of-minor-set
>    action.  If a dance merely has you and your partner progress
>    to new neighbors in the middle of the tune (instead of at the
>    transition from B2 to A1), and you stay in that new foursome
>    until the same point in the next round of the dance, then I
>    don't count it as out-of-minor-set action.  I also don't count
>    merely taking hands in long lines with a shadow or a past or
>    future neighbor while you still have your partner or your
>    current neighbor in the other hand.
> 
>    If dancers are doing something in groups of four, I count any
>    dancers near the top or bottom to the set who aren't part of
>    a complete foursome as neutral.  This includes the case where
>    a pair dancers stand still during a diagonal ladies' chain
>    or a diagonal right and left through because there's nobody
>    to do it with.
> 
>    If most of the dancers are doing a two-person figure with
>    partners, neighbors, or shadows on the sides of the set,
>    then I count as neutral any dancers at the top or bottom
>    who are (1) standing still, (2) "dancing with ghosts", or
>    (3) dancing the figure with someone *across* the set
>    (possibly a partner or shadow acting as a neighbor).
> 
> --Jim
> 
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