Hello All,
I have come up with a preliminary program for my dance in East Sandwich
on December 18th. This turned out to be fairly difficult since I haven't
collected very many easy dances. I spent a lot of time with my nose in
"Give and Take" and the other books I have. The crowd will be fairly
unpredictable with regards to the balance of beginner and experienced
dancers since it is right before a holiday and people will be visiting
from out of town or looking for an excuse to escape their families.
I know that there are parts of the program that aren't optimal, but I
feel like there is a progression in teaching figures and a lack of
repetition (except for Long Lines early in the program, but I didn't
know how to get away from that). I have included a couple of moderately
more difficult dances that I can substitute in the program if I feel
like there are enough experienced people to carry them.
See the attached PDF file for the dance cards for this program. I have
made some minor changes to a couple of the dances to fit the program and
the crowd.
Marian's Delight (with mods)
La Bastringue
The Carousel
Forgotten Treasure
The Baby Rose
The Second Time Around (Alt: Mary Kay's Reel)
Judah Jig
-----
Waltz
-----
Break
-----
Hambo
-----
Midwest Folklore
Another Nice Combination (Alt: Chorus Jig)
Zoe and Me
Bertha's Landfall
Al's Safeway Produce (mod)
I would love to get feedback from people about what they think. Am I
being too ambitious in certain places?
Thank you!
Chris
I like your program, Chris. It gradually introduces moves. Maybe you could switch the Carousel with Forgotten
Treasures. I think the dancers (beginners) would be more successful at the Carousel having done two contras, one
having circle left 3/4 into a swing. Therefore the hey would be the only significant move to teach the new
people. I have a suggestion for callers. Before calling an evening's dance make a list of all of the contra
moves (like ladies chain, hey etc.) Then, besides each move list the frequency that each move will be used for
the entire evening. Swings will usually get the most frequency. Circle right may not occur at all. In the
program that Chris is going to use, there is almost a circle left in every dance (usually circle left 3/4). But
I wouldn't worry about this. The way the program becomes difficult and then gets easier toward the end is the
most important aspect of programming for me. I think I called an entire evening where all but one dance had
forward and back. The dancers had a good time. I think one dancer noticed.
The idea of listing moves and their frequency came from (I think) the Southern California Square Dancers Assoc.
Callers in this Assoc. decided to record an entire festival- multiple halls! They then went over those recordings
and listed the frequency that each call was used. Considering how many moves are fit in each dance, that was
quite an undertaking!!!!!! Western square dancers take lessons for a year before they graduate. This square
dance assoc. structured their year long lessons on this frequency, teaching the most called moves first. In
other words, the dancers practiced the more popular moves the mostest.
Tom
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> 1. Re: Dec. 18 program for E. Sandwich (Chris Weiler)
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Mon, 13 Dec 2004 23:27:50 -0500
> From: Chris Weiler <chris.weiler(a)weirdtable.org>
> Subject: Re: [Callers] Dec. 18 program for E. Sandwich
> To: callers(a)sharedweight.net
> Cc: amy.larkin(a)netzero.com
> Message-ID: <41BE6BC6.5090109(a)weirdtable.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> Skipped content of type multipart/alternative
Hey everybody!
Does someone have the sequence for Esmerelda's Revenge by Beth Parkes?
It was suggested to me as a good dance for beginners. I've looked in my
reference books and on the Web, but no luck.
Thanks!
Chris
Hi! I received a request about what I ended up doing for my dance cards
and thought I would reply to the list.
I decided not to use a database program (although I have to admit that I
didn't try very hard to look for one). I would be interested in knowing
what program people are using and how they like it, though. I decided to
go for looks instead. I used MS PowerPoint to make slides and formatted
them the way I wanted to look at the card. You can see an example in the
attached PDF file.
First I'll talk about the dance card, then I'll talk about the Legend.
Most of the card is self-explanatory: title in the upper left, formation
and author on the upper right. Where you might not understand is at the
bottom edge: I have put (in notation) each of the non-universal moves
that appear in the dance. You can look at the legend card to see what
letter codes I used for each figure. This allows me to put the cards in
order on the table and do a quick scan for patterns (too many stars in a
row or too many contra corners in the evening). The notation in the
bottom center is also described on the legend card: It counts the types
of swings that appear in the dance. Again, this allows me to look for
patterns while I'm programming and to make sure I don't go too long
without a neighbor swing or if the dance is unequal.
The last code at the bottom is just a placeholder at this time. I know
that I want to sort the dances somehow later on, but right now I don't
know how I want to do it. It could be a code for Beginner or Advanced,
or it could be a code for a certain type of figure. I'll decide that later.
PowerPoint has a search utility, so I can use that when I'm looking for
a dance.
Hope this has helped!
Chris
On those "New Caller" Evaluation Forms 12/4/04
Could someone post a sample evaluation form?
Are there any items you now wish were asked about, but didn't originally
think to ask?
Any items that didn't give you useful responses or information?
Thanks! Mark
For those of you in the Boston area:
A New Callers Dance
Saturday, December 4th, 2-5pm
in Arlington, MA
Introducing callers:
Chris Weiler
Seth Seeger
Nathaniel Jack
Flyer:
http://www.seeger.ws/dec4_contradance.pdf
We hope that people can come and support us!
Thanks!
Chris
I thought this item from the [trad-dance-callers] list would interest and amuse.
Mark Jones
Ralphsweet(a)aol.com wrote ..
>
> I just survived (as a dancer) another of the first (and best)
> weekends of the month , Friday and Saturday nights at the Guiding Star
> Grange in
> Greenfield, MA. Friday night, one of our favorite bands (The Moving
> Violations) and callers - (Sue Rosen) - 200 people, including 2, 75
> year old guys,
> 1, 79, and 1 80-year old couple, a van-load of 15 girls from Mt Holyoke,
> some more from Smith, Hampshire, & U-Mass. A few college guys too.
> Even a
> car load from Wesleyan Univ in CT - a 1 1/2 hour drive. This helped
> to
> offset the usual gender imbalance of 10 -20 extra guys. Of course this
> forced
> us older men to dance with younger women most of the time, but we bore
> this
> hardship cheerfully.
> Everyone was in high spirits - Cheers would ring out from the crowd
> spontaneously whenever the band changed keys or tunes. Everyone clapped
> on the
> petronella twirls, and the caller didn't even try to stop us! One medley
> consisted of 3 tunes of GYPSY music from classical sources. Between dances
> I
> discussed with the lead fiddler, Van Kaynor, and Sue, the caller,
> whether
> this might put them "over the edge" as to Political Correctness, but
> she
> called several dances with gypsies anyway, saying that she was not concerned
> -
> had too much to think about to worry about it. (Sue is on this message
> board, but seldom replies to the discussions. I told her I would report
> this,
> she was amused and said OK)
> During the break, to celebrate the holiday season, we were treated
> to a
> sword dance-mummer's play, and on Saturday night, to a Morris dance
> demonstration by a team of teens from Northern VT, who of course danced
> with us
> all night.
> Saturday Night was just as much fun, same attendance, plenty of
> cheers, gypsies, claps, even more college girls, many beginners, some
> high
> school boys AND girls. Wild Asparagus played, George Marshall called,
> - it was
> great!
> We are so fortunate to have such a great hall within easy reach of 5
> colleges, and a vast reservoir of dancers from CT, MA, VT, and NH,
> and close to
> a major highway, with what we believe are the best bands and callers
> in the
> USA twice each week!! Ralph Sweet
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
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I think that your advanced planning will really pay off. I like many of these
dances and want to try them out in the future. I have a question about two of
them. I think it's Roll 11 that has a B2 with 1/2 promenade, circle left 3/4,
calif twirl. If anyone has danced this does it fits 16 beats? If so, is it
rushed and would the tempo of the music make a difference (a bit too fast would
cause the dances to get behind)? Rockin' Robin has a B2 that includes circle
left 1 1/4, veer left , veer right. I really like the flow of this. I assume
that the circle 1 1/4 takes 10 beats. Therefore the veer left and veer right
would take 6 beats. I'm guessing it's danceable but not at a fast tempo. Has
anyone danced Rockin Robin?
I think that I'd like to know much more about the abilities of the dancers
before I could make any comments about the program. What percentage of the
dancers will be beginners? When I plan a dance I like the first 2-3 dances of
the evening to be bomb proof so that the beginners will build confidence and
start to trust me. If there'll be a high percentage of beginners, might you
be taking a chance with the circle mixer as a second dance? Much confusion can
occur in the grand right and left-turn back. I look forward to finding out how
your evening goes.
Tom
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> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Seth--how was your first full dance? (Seth Seeger)
> 2. Program for 12/4 (Linda A. Leslie)
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 16:33:37 -0500
> From: Seth Seeger <seth(a)seeger.ws>
> Subject: Re: [Callers] Seth--how was your first full dance?
> To: Shared Weight <callers(a)sharedweight.net>
> Message-ID: <7F0B72A8-4317-11D9-BBA9-000A959CF174(a)seeger.ws>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
>
> Thanks for asking! I've been meaning to get this out for a few days
> now.
>
> My first full calling gig in East Sandwich, MA went VERY well! East
> Sandwich is a wonderful dance community with fun people. Sadly, it is
> one where attendance can greatly fluctuate. Fortunately, I brought
> along 10 friends which brought the dance up to about 20 people.
>
> I think programming the dance was one of the hardest parts. Mostly
> because my collection of dances is still pretty small, I didn't have a
> nice library to pull dances from. (While I do have a good number of
> book resources, it's hard to pull dances out of them - I prefer dances
> that I've danced before.) Half way through the planning, I realized
> that all but one dance had allemandes in them! Linda Leslie was
> wonderful and spent a few hours on the phone with me helping me through
> dance placement and ordering.
>
> I started out using the planning matrix from the back of Give & Take,
> but found that it had too much information on it. I ended up using a
> grid that I got from Lisa Greenleaf that only has 14 criteria, instead
> of the 35 in G&T. I am planning on moving all my dances to white index
> cards, so I can highlight moves (all in different colors). That will
> allow me to plan out my evening visually, instead of on a paper.
> (Rearranging cards on a table is easier than having to continually
> re-write the planning matrix.)
>
> Here is what I ended up with:
>
> 1. Cascades - Orace Johnson
> 2. Al's Safeway Produce - Robert Cromartie
> 3. Simplicity Give & Take - Linda Leslie (was Simplicity Swing by
> Becky Hill)
> 4. Carousel - Tom Hinds
> 5. Square Affair - Becky Hill
> 6. Roll Eleven - Sue Rosen & Larry Jennings
> *break*
> 7. Ramsey Chase - Joseph Pimentel
> 8. Mary Cay's Reel - David Kaynor
> 9. Happy As A Cold Pig In Warm Mud - Mike Boerschig
> 10. Rockin' Robin - Rick Mohr
> 11. Marian's Delight - Carol Kopp
>
> The evening was fun - surprisingly I wasn't nervous! Working with Amy
> and John Larkin was fantastic. Very flexible and easy to work with. I
> didn't worry at all about what kind of music to put to each dance.
> Just show Amy the card and she makes great picks.
>
> A few times, I found myself calling an incorrect call (during the
> dance). It would happen without me even knowing! (Fortunately, the
> dancers weren't listing to me by that point!) One dance did start to
> fall apart - I don't know if I said something incorrect or if the dance
> was just hard to keep track of. Luckily, one of my trusty dancers knew
> where we were supposed to be and the dance continued on. (I had lost
> my place too!) By the end of the evening, I was completely exhausted,
> but I felt great.
>
> For three of the dances, I had written out the patter (because I had a
> lot to say). However, I found reading off of this different format
> difficult and disorienting. In the future, I will work harder to
> memorize the patter I want say so I can just call of my card like I did
> for the rest of dances.
>
> One last piece of difficulty I had was remembering where dancers had
> started in the line. It must have just been one too many things for me
> to keep track of. I tried remembering who was at the top of the line,
> and I tried picking one person and always looking to see where they
> started. Neither worked with great success. Everything worked out
> just fine in the end, though. Amy was great about extending the dance
> out one more time through when I had miscalculated having everyone in
> for the last time through the dance.
>
> Now that all is said and done, I am pretty happy with my program. It
> had a lot of dances in it that I really like to dance. I still felt
> that it had a bit of repetition in the moves, but it can't always be
> avoided.
>
> Seth
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 17:13:23 -0500
> From: "Linda A. Leslie" <laleslierjg(a)comcast.net>
> Subject: [Callers] Program for 12/4
> To: <Callers(a)sharedweight.net>
> Message-ID: <BDD25AB3.891A%laleslierjg(a)comcast.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>
> So sorry that I will be out of town on December 4th! Looks as though all of
> you will have a great time....my best wishes to all of you: Seth, Chris, and
> Nathaniel.
>
> The program looks terrific! Two notes for Nathaniel, in "It's a Pirate's
> Life..." At the A2, a pass through to a wave only takes 4 beats of the
> music, then a wave balance (also 4 beats), and the Rory O'More spin (also 4
> beats); this means there are 4 beats still left. The gent's allemande will
> then start during the A2, rather than the beginning of the B1. So that
> partner swing will be a nice long one (unless you put a Balance in there).
>
> Also a question about American Gothic: Is the Mad Robin oriented toward your
> neighbor (along), or toward your partner (across)? The pass through along at
> the end of the dance makes me think that is with neighbor; otherwise, when
> passing through, each dancer must turn to face partner in order to
> accomplish the Mad Robin. I enjoy doing Mad Robins a lot! So your dance
> intrigues me, so I want to understand it in the way you intended it. Thanks!
>
> Linda Leslie
>
> ------------------------------
>
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> End of Callers Digest, Vol 4, Issue 1
> *************************************
