Contra Callers August 2017

contracallers@lists.sharedweight.net

9 participants
22 discussions

by Amy Wimmer via Callers

Hi All, I recently had the opportunity to call a contra to a group of rank beginners in a difficult situation: outdoors, on sloping concrete, without amplification for either myself or the band, to people not expecting a dance, with a band mostly unfamiliar with either contra or fiddle tunes, who had no opportunity to practice or choose tunes. It was a staff party with a barnyard theme. Granted, this particular good of people is accustomed to being spontaneous and silly at times, most are in their 20's, and it's a liberal, accepting group. The organizers wanted to use the terms "cows" and "chickens" instead of any other usual terms for dancers. When they arrived at the party each person chose a name tag with either a cow or a chicken on it. They didn't know it, but this determined which role they'd play in the dance. I arbitrarily chose to "put the chicken on the right, because the chicken is always right." (I keep chickens, and they ARE always right) There was not time for much of a lesson, either. It'd have been much easier if everyone had joined the dance at the beginning. All said, just about everyone had a really great time, myself included. The band was hyped up to try another dance evening later in the week, though that never materialized. I never mentioned gender in any way. That part just seemed to not matter. They were dancing with their friends. It didn't matter that they weren't experts or even very good. I was heartened and encouraged to try something like this again, perhaps with more widely used dancer terms. -Amy

6 years, 8 months

Re: [Callers] Seeking *lists* of tunes for patter squares

by jim saxe via Callers

Folks, When I sent out my request back in May soliciting lists of recommended tunes for patter squares, I wrote: > ... If you got this query via a mailing list, please send > tune lists directly to me and *not* to the entire mailing list. > .., I'm trying to see which tunes get mentioned > *independently* by many recommenders, so I don't want the lists > anyone sends me to be influenced one way or another by whatever > suggestions other people have already sent. ... > > I plan to gather recommendations for the next couple months and > to post a summary some time in July. Now it's the end of July, and I find myself in a bit of a quandary, since I haven't gathered nearly as much data as I'd hoped, and I'd prefer not to have my results so far circulating around and possibly biasing anyone else who might yet supply input. On the other hand, I don't want to renege on providing a summary. So what I'm going to do is take some more time (possibly several months, at the rate things are going). But meanwhile if anyone's impatient for a summary, you can contact me off-list (Jim dot Saxe at-sign gmail dot com), and I'll send a brief synopsis of what I've gathered as of today, July 31. (Note: This will only include information from recent informants and a few other recent sources, not all the stuff I'm still working on from old books, articles, record catalogs, etc.) Meanwhile thanks to the following persons who have supplied tune lists in response either to my queries on trad-dance-callers and the SharedWeight or (more commonly) to other requests either by email or in person: T-Claw supplied a list of tunes that he and other participants shared at a session called "List of Favorite Square Dance Tunes" at the 2015 Dare To Be Square Weekend in Nashville. Bob Dalsemer supplied a short list of tunes that he had gathered from three Brasstown area fiddlers. He also supplied a tune list from an unpublished manuscript by the late D. B. Hendrix with more tunes than the ones listed in his book _Smoky Mountain Square Dances_ (but I'm not including that list in my "recent sources" category). I also got tune lists from Erik Hoffman, Bill Litchman, Tony Mates, Jim McKinney, David Millstone, Tony Parkes, Jordan Ruyle, Don Stratton, and Vivian Williams. Thanks, all. I also got at least one well-intentioned reply that seemed so far off target from what I requested that I couldn't use it (thanks all the same if you know who you are). --Jim

6 years, 8 months

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Contra Callers August 2017