Contra Callers February 2013

contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net

41 participants
32 discussions

by Hgrastorf＠aol.com

I haven't actually had a chance to road test this (and my thanks, by the way, to Bob Isaacs, who was his usual gracious and helpful self when I asked him to look at it before I posted it). James is correct that the opposite sex person one passes in stepping into the wave is the same person both times. If I'm L1, my current neighbor -- M2 -- passes me by the right shoulder and is facing the same direction as I face in the first wave. After the swing, M2 is still across from me (with his shadow on his right). He passes me again by the right shoulder and is facing the same direction in the second wave as well. (So it's a little like the progression up and down the line in Flapjack Express -- you travel away from your partner in parallel with your current opposite sex neighbor, come back in parallel with that neighbor, and each of you finds your respective partner for a swing.) I do think (from a safety standpoint) that it's a good idea to keep the couples out of the center of the set during the short swing -- we've all had the experience of the joined-hands-swing-bonk, I assume -- and my "make the ladies come to you" instruction really had that purpose in mind. If anybody else calls this, I would love to know how it went. I wrote it as a smooth "cool down" dance after something particularly vigorous -- hence the name. I think reels would suit, with an absolutely identical and slightly bouncy A1 and 2, and a very smooth B1-2? It would have a very different feel with jigs, I think, but I hope to try it both ways. April Blum In a message dated 2/22/2013 12:00:46 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, callers-request(a)sharedweight.net writes: Today's Topics: 1. Re: Does this dance already exist? (Michael Barraclough) 2. Re: Does this dance already exist? (James Saxe) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2013 12:42:41 -0500 From: Michael Barraclough <michael(a)michaelbarraclough.com> To: Caller's discussion list <callers(a)sharedweight.net> Subject: Re: [Callers] Does this dance already exist? Message-ID: <1361468561.2881.9.camel@The-Beast> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" I called this in Baltimore last night (? world premier). It is a good dance but it is ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL to ensure that the men do not move from where they are in the swings in A1/A2. I taught it emphasizing this and called it thus. However, as I reduced my calling, so the men started moving. The result is that the positions move and couples don't know who the opposite couple is with ultimate chaos as odd couples get left out in the middle of the dance. I stopped the dance, re-emphasized the need for the men to stay put and we were just fine when they heeded the advice! Michael Barraclough www.michaelbarraclough.com On Mon, 2013-02-18 at 17:10 -0500, Hgrastorf(a)aol.com wrote: > Wrote this one on my way back from calling Norfolk. > > Slow M'Ocean Becket > > A1 Pass thru to an Ocean Wave (Ps are facing in opposite directions). > Balance forward and back. Swing your SHADOW (who is facing you in the next > wave). (Gents, make the ladies come to you.) End facing across. > A2 Pass thru to an Ocean Wave. Balance F/B -- swing your Partner, who is > facing you in the next wave. End facing your original Ns. > B1 Ladies chain to your N. Ladies allemande R 1.5 (continue to hold Rt hands) > B2 Ladies pick up your partner, star promenade across with a butterfly > whirl (to the lady's side). Promenade across (to gent's side), with ladies > passing RIGHT shoulders, and curl RIGHT to face the next neighbor, ready to > pass the Ocean. > > I can't think of another dance that starts this way -- anybody? > > April Blum > _______________________________________________ > Callers mailing list > Callers(a)sharedweight.net > http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers ----------------------------- Message: 2 Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2013 18:23:30 -0800 From: James Saxe <jim.saxe(a)gmail.com> To: Caller's discussion list <callers(a)sharedweight.net> Subject: Re: [Callers] Does this dance already exist? Message-ID: <FE997E49-8469-4AF6-8B6E-C0056CD488A9(a)gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes I've never called "Slow M'Ocean", but from diagramming it on paper it seems to me that the A1/A2 should work perfectly well (and leave dancers back in their original starting positions at the end of A2) if men and women advance EQUALLY to get into the swings. In this case, the "Pass thru to an Ocean Wave" actions in A2 will have everyone passing the same opposite-sex neighbor as in A1 (but the same-sex neighbors will be different for both men and women). In Michael's interpretation, if I understand it correctly, the Ocean Waves have the same pairs of men in A2 as in A1. I suspect very s trongly that my interpretation is the one the author (April Blum) intended, but I invite her to speak for herself on the matter. The progression in B2 where couples pass by W's R shoulder and loop R (relative to out-facing direction, i.e., clockwise around a big oval) is rather unusual and is the part that I'd expect to give the most difficulty. --Jim______________________________________________ Callers mailing list Callers(a)sharedweight.net http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers End of Callers Digest, Vol 102, Issue 17 ****************************************

11 years, 9 months

Re Slow M'Ocean

by Hgrastorf＠aol.com

In a message dated 2/22/2013 3:53:17 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, callers-request(a)sharedweight.net writes: Send Callers mailing list submissions to callers(a)sharedweight.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to callers-request(a)sharedweight.net You can reach the person managing the list at callers-owner(a)sharedweight.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Callers digest..." Today's Topics: 2. Re: Slow M'Ocean (Perry Shafran) Message: 2 Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2013 10:04:02 -0800 (PST) From: Perry Shafran <pshaf(a)yahoo.com> To: Caller's discussion list <callers(a)sharedweight.net> Subject: Re: [Callers] Slow M'Ocean Message-ID: <1361556242.16277.YahooMailNeo(a)web120702.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 April, This is if both the gents and ladies move to their shadow rather than just the ladies moving, as originally written, yes?? Because the way it's originally written (and the way we danced it on Wednesday), when the gents don't move, then it's the same same-sex neighbor each time.? Did you intend for the gents and ladies to both move towards their shadow and stay with their neighbors?? I thought it was a REALLY nice and fun dance, BTW, and magic when everyone finally got it. Perry **************************************** It's a little like Double Mud Pig, in that you have a permanent shadow (for the ladies, it's the gent to the left of their partner, on the same side of the set, for the gents right ditto), but also, during each iteration of the dance, you have a "temporary" shadow -- your current opposite sex neighbor. That neighbor/shadow is with you in both waves, and the ladies chain to that neighbor at B1, but you never swing that N/S. Does that answer your question? I don't think it matters if both parties move, AS LONG AS you wind up across from your (new) opposite sex neighbor at the beginning of each iteration, that same N at the end of A1, and at the end of A2. I suspect that the dance offsets slightly (as does Double Mud Pig, a wonderful dance which also tends to break down, with a couple left out in the middle). Thank you for letting me know you enjoyed it. April

11 years, 9 months

What sets the feel of a dance? (Was: What to ask a band before the gig?)

by Maia McCormick

Jumping off from the aforementioned thread, I'm sure this is quite an elementary question, but one I've never had to deal with before because I do most of my calling to a student band that has barely cobbled together a set list for the dance in question and so isn't really capable of much collaborating: what exactly sets the mood/feel of a dance? What are certain adjectives you'd apply to a dance or it's music based on the move-content? What sort of dances tend to go better to jigs as opposed to reels and vice versa? I'd love to hear what you all think! Cheers, Maia

11 years, 9 months

What to ask a band before the gig?

by Ron T Blechner

Hi Shared Weight, I have a few gigs coming up in a short span of time, and I try and touch base with the band at least a week out, if possible. I open the door for them to ask any questions for me, or to make any suggestions for a caller to make things easier / more fun for them to play their music. I also ask a few questions. I try and keep it to a minimum, so I don't come off too demanding. What sorts of questions do you ask bands prior to the dance, especially by e-mail / phone? A couple I like are: - Do they have particular music sets they like to play at certain times, like, to end the night, etc? - Especially if I haven't heard them before in person, what overall types of music do they enjoy playing the most? I'd love to hear your thoughts. Best, Ron T Blechner contradances.tumblr.com/ron

11 years, 9 months

Does this dance already exist?

by Hgrastorf＠aol.com

Wrote this one on my way back from calling Norfolk. Slow M'Ocean Becket A1 Pass thru to an Ocean Wave (Ps are facing in opposite directions). Balance forward and back. Swing your SHADOW (who is facing you in the next wave). (Gents, make the ladies come to you.) End facing across. A2 Pass thru to an Ocean Wave. Balance F/B -- swing your Partner, who is facing you in the next wave. End facing your original Ns. B1 Ladies chain to your N. Ladies allemande R 1.5 (continue to hold Rt hands) B2 Ladies pick up your partner, star promenade across with a butterfly whirl (to the lady's side). Promenade across (to gent's side), with ladies passing RIGHT shoulders, and curl RIGHT to face the next neighbor, ready to pass the Ocean. I can't think of another dance that starts this way -- anybody? April Blum

11 years, 9 months

Re: [Callers] Callers Digest, Vol 102, Issue 14

by Meg Dedolph

Hi everyone, I'll put on my guitar-player hat here for a minute ... I'm in a band that likes to see the cards, or at least get a quick summary of the dance, especially where the balances are. Something like, "There are balances at the A1 and B1 and the rest of it is smooth," or "There are lots of gypsies in this dance," is enough information, generally. The rest of it, we can figure out watching the walkthrough. I like to know if the caller is pro- or anti-jig. We are a Midwestern band in a strong old-time dance community and we've run into some anti-jig sentiment. :) I like callers to tell us if they have anything that's not a contra on their program - do they plan to call squares (and in that case, do they need a square tune or can we play a 3-part or otherwise crooked tune), do they plan to call mixers, how many waltzes do they want in the evening, etc. As far as ahead of time goes - if you have a specific dance that calls for a specific tune, I like to know that before I show up for the gig -- e.g. Chorus Jig, Levi Jackson Rag, etc. Admittedly, we're a little weird. Of the four of us, one is a caller (me), and the remaining three are dating/ married to callers (including my husband), so I like to think we're a little more caller-aware sometimes. If for no other reason than they've all heard the various affiliated callers grumble about the stuff bands do that we hate. :) Nice discussion - hope this is helpful, Meg (Chicago)

11 years, 9 months

Contra Card — a LaTeX class

by Sam Whited

Hi all: For the past few day I've been working on a class for the LaTeX document typesetting system called `Contra Card.' As you can imagine, it's used for typesetting calling cards. The class (and associated documentation) can be found at http://www.ctan.org/pkg/contracard and development happens on GitHub at https://github.com/SamWhited/contra-card. If you're technically inclined — or are the kind of person who appreciates good typesetting — I hope you'll check it out and give me feedback about what works, what doesn't, what features you'd like to see, etc. Thanks, Sam -- Sam Whited pub 4096R/EC2C9934 https://samwhited.com/contact

11 years, 9 months

Re: [Callers] Seeking on 80 beat "crooked" tune

by Edmund Croft

Scottish country dance videos may help, as in many cases there is no caller, and 40-bar/80-beat dances are much more common than in contra. For example, here's Mairi's Wedding, a forty-bar reel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRpLfLurI5s Or search for Type: Reel or Jig; Bars: 40; Video: checked on http://my.strathspey.org/dd/search/dance/. Two provisos - SCDs usually run only eight times through and the music goes rather more slowly than contra (108-16 vs 120-130 bpm). Yours faithfully, Edmund Croft, Cambridge, UK. Jonathan King wrote: > I'm looking for an online tune for practicing calling "Major Hey" - it has five sixteen-beat parts (80 beats). I'm looking for just an instrumental version of some 80 beat tune, no calling, no singing.

11 years, 9 months

Seeking on 80 beat "crooked" tune [Thank you]

by squash＠ufl.edu

/--------------------------------------------------------\ Yoyo Zhou wrote: Fri Feb 15 21:04:18 EST 2013 After some more digging, I found an 80-beat / 40-bar tune (AABCC), The Maids of Mt. Kisco: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKDfjOpx0Yc (just the first 3 times through) I also found some AABCC versions of Elzic's Farewell: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1ieaEHk77c http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdeSSEYryBE (too fast tempo) \________________________________________________________/ Marvelous! As always, the benefits of a Community. (Guess that's what "Shared" means) Thank you very much. -Jonathan King

11 years, 9 months

Seeking on 80 beat "crooked" tune

by squash＠ufl.edu

Thank you all (and thank you Yoyo Zhou for identifying Cis) for suggestions on modifying tunes to fit "Major Hey". There are YouTube videas, purely instrumental, of the 72-beat version of "Cherokee Shuffle", e.g, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYduAMqy-Z8 which can be used for practicing calling the eponymous dance. Now I'm guessing the answer is "no", but just to clarify: Do any of you know of a YouTube video (or Vimeo, or similar) with musicians playing an 80-beat tune [but with no calling nor singing]? Cheers, -Jonathan King

11 years, 9 months

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Contra Callers February 2013