Hi Don,
As has been said, you really need to find out what they think they
mean and what they are hoping for. As an example:
Irish people dancing Waves of Tory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsDw57nqUrk
English people dancing Waves of Tory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1qtN-kw6Mg
Note how the timing, styling, speed are all completely different, especially
on the Dip 'n' Dive - the Irish take their time, the English rush through
it.
You need to know which they are aiming for!
Even the waltzing is different. I did a gig for an Irish group
recently, The older ladies kept demanding higher speeds - their idea of
waltz was 50% faster than the average at a contra dance!
Good luck!
Happy dancing,
John
John Sweeney, Dancer, England john(a)modernjive.com 01233 625 362
http://www.contrafusion.co.uk for Dancing in Kent
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Hi SharedWeight callers & friends
I'm a caller from RI and am fairly new to this site. I have been enjoying the informational posts on the many different issues that involve present day and past contra dancing.
In April I have been asked to call at what is being billed as an "Irish Contra Dance". Contra dancing as I know has its roots in New England and before that in English Country Dancing and French Court Dances. Unfortunately I only know one Irish contra Dance that is used at some beginner contra dances - "The Sweets of May". Are there others that have been tailored to the set style of contra dancing? Your suggestions will be gratefully received.
Cheers,
Don
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Long wave Rory O'Moore balance and slides/spins and box circulates ... in
the same dance, adjacent to one another?
I've not yet seen or danced any. Anyone have?
I have a few dances; trying one or two this week.
In dance,
Ron Blechner
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Hello all,
Last week, at our regular monthly dance for the Mad Robin Callers
Collective, we tried Ports and Starboards instead of Gents and Ladies (the
usual language for our dance). The MRCC dance is called by a collection of
callers who work together ahead of time on a program for the evening. MRCC
callers are interested in developing and honing their craft as dance
facilitators.
We had over a hundred dancers, a slightly bigger than average turn-out for
us. A majority (60~70%) of whom knew the evening was going to be called
gender free (we'd announced it at prior dances, on our flyer, and via our
e-mail list).
We had a handful of dancers who explicitly came to our dance because we
were using gender free language. We had one caller explicitly come out
because we were using gender free language.
We did not have anyone say they were avoiding our dance because of gender
free language, but I acknowledge they might not have let us know.
All six of our callers were able to make the transition to Ports and
Starboards, and didn't have any prompting slips on mic. The callers were
able to keep clear in their head which word went with which roll (ports on
the left after a swing, starboards on the right).
Starboards was not an easy word to say, but it did not seem to create
confusion with stars; possibly because stars are prompted as left hand
star, right hands across star, etc; whereas starboards was used with star
coming first in the call, starboards chain, etc.
At least one dancer had an initial confusion about port/starboard being in
reference to direction currently facing, as opposed to a property of the
room (which would be more in line with how it's used on boats).
A few dancers who have danced to armbands/barearms terminology did say that
they preferred ports/startboards. I did not hear anyone advocate a
preference for armbands/barearms.
Using different terminology for the roles did cause some added difficulty
on the floor. Not everyone was immediately able to identify themselves and
where they needed to be/what they should be doing. It also meant that our
experienced dancers were not as able to help guide new dancers on the
floor, both because they themselves were less confident, and they were less
certain of their assumptions of the role of the neighbor coming at them.
(We did not use any sort of marker for the different roles. Not out of
deliberately eschewing them, but didn't get that part put together.) I
think the average skill level of our dance as ports/starboards dancers was
below the average skill level of our dance as gents/ladies dancers; but it
would not be an insurmountable barrier to fully swap over.
The use of gender free language did not cause a large amount of folks
dancing a role different than their apparent traditional role. We had folks
swap (even mid-dance), but that happens at our dance anyway. It may have
upped it slightly, but it may have depressed it slightly as folks lost the
comfort of thinking 'I'm a man dancing the women's role' (or such) and had
to translate 'I'm usually a port currently dancing as a starboard'. That
effect would go away with long term familiarity, but we're certainly not
there yet.
We are not planning on fully swapping over our terms permanently. Next
month, we'll return to using gents & ladies as our terms. However, we (the
callers and the dancers) are entertaining thoughts of having a dance in the
evening called gender free, possibly exploring the different label options,
and/or possibly developing a catalog of dances that don't require gender
differentiation (no neighbor swings, gents allemands, ladies chains, etc).
Personally, I'm happy that we brought a few folks out to the dance that
wouldn't have come otherwise. Maybe they'll come back even if we use
gendered language in the future. Maybe they'll start a gender free dance. I
think there were also some on-the-floor discussions of gender and role and
identity, and I have no report of any of those being negative experiences.
For our community, I'd call it a success.
Happy Dancing,
Luke Donforth
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Found an unlined 3x5 card in my deck with this dance written in pencil in
mysterious, shaky handwriting. The card has the title Late in the Evening,
though I have no idea if that's the actual title. Attributions, anyone?
A1: (new) N bal & box the gnat
mad robin (gents forward first... gents cross set to...)
A2: P gypsy
P swing
B1: gents alle L 1 1/2
N swing
B2: square through
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Another recent composition (thanks to Luke for getting me thinking about
Zig-Zags!), called this to good feedback earlier this month.
Only tricky part of the teaching was the A2 through B1 Hey entry... how
would you teach this? I generally hate breaking the flow of a dance in a
walk-through if possible to maintain it, but some folks got lost when I
first taught it as "...Hey - Gents pass left shoulders across, Pass Partner
Right..."
My current thinking is to form a teaching-only wave across with Gents by
left in center, have them note the side Gent is on (will Swing P back here
when meet second time), drop hands and start the Hey.
Thanks,
-Don
PS: At least one dancer needed re-assurance that passing through in reverse
of progression was correct the first time around. :)
*Hey, Let's Zig-Zag!*
[Type]: Contra [Formation]: Duple Improper [Author]: Don Veino
[Status]: DV::
[Comments]: Zig-Zag into Hey dance (first of it's kind?). Tricky two
forward, one back progression.
::
[A1]:
(4,12) NEIGHBOR BALANCE, SWING
::
[A2]:
(4,4) CIRCLE LEFT 1/2, Ladies lead P ZIG LEFT [past CURRENT Ns]
(4) ZAG RIGHT [passing NEXT Ns, to face 3rd Ns] and SEPARATE from P
#PROGRESSION 1&2
(4) HEY 1/8, GENTS START BY LEFT [across set, GL, PR, etc.]
::
[B1]:
(8) HALF HEY [so 5/8 total, until meet P 2nd time]
(8) PARTNER SWING [on Lady's home side]
::
[B2]:
(4,4) RING BALANCE, LADIES ROLL GENTS [DIAGONALLY back-to-back across set,
NO Half Sashay] *OR* Alternate: Gents Cross by Right
(4,4) RING BALANCE, PASS THROUGH [Up/Dn] in REVERSE of progression
#DE-PROGRESSION
::
[Notes]: TEACH - NEVER OUT - do what those in the dance want you to do at
ends! End effects TBC, but expect it is to wait out with Lady on Left ready
to Zag right towards the Hey.
Can have dancers swap places up/down with their N after hands-4 - this is
the direction they'll come into the A1 Balance. Linda Leslie suggested a B2
Gents cross in place of my original draft's Gents See-Saw 1+1/2, added a
Gents Roll Away option for more connection.::
[Tunes]: ::
[Provenance]: From author. Composed 2/23/2015. First called Scout House
3/9/15 with Gents Cross in B2::
[Tags]: DI, Intermediate-Advanced, DV::
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Hello, Callers,
I am the talent coordinator for the Toronto Contra Dance.
If there are any of you great callers who would like to come to Toronto to call, please give me a shout and tell me something about what you do.
We dance on the second and fourth Saturdays of each month from September to mid-June.
Thanks!
Elizabeth Szekeres
Www.tcdance.org
Talent(a)tcdance.org
Sent from my iPhone
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>From Ed Butenhoff's book, "Dance Parties for Beginners"
Question - "How do I get good judgement?" Answer "Experience."
Question - "How do I get experience?" Answer "BAD JUDGEMENT..."
We all take our lumps, and hopefully learn from it... hang in there, Brooks!
Ben Allbrandt
---- Jacob Nancy Bloom via Callers <callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
> I would absolutely believe that the dancers were completely confounded by
> "right and left through". I remember how surprised I was, when I called my
> first dance, to discover how much more confusing it was than a Ladie's
> Chain. If you are used to both of them, then you tend to think of them as
> being similar. If you've never done either, then one of them has you
> connected to other people, while the other leaves you by yourself, trying
> to figure out which way to turn (and usually getting it wrong.)
>
> But learning which figures are easier and harder comes quickly. Learning
> which dances to call for a given crowd and how to teach them efficiently is
> a neverending process!
>
> Jacob
>
> On Fri, Mar 27, 2015 at 10:47 AM, Brooks Hart via Callers <
> callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
>
> > So, as the original poster, I am reporting back.
> >
> > The dance with the solo fiddler was a mixed bag. The music was very nice,
> > but because I am new to calling, and our dancers are 99% beginners, way too
> > much time was spent on walk-throughs and teaching. The fiddler sat out for
> > long stretches of time, which seemed like a waste of his time and the money
> > spent on live music.
> >
> > I thought I had picked easy dances, but you wouldn't believe how
> > confounded so many of the people were at "right and left through", and
> > that falls on me and my lack of experience with teaching and crowd
> > wrangling.
> >
> > A special moment for everyone, though, was doing a circle waltz dance with
> > the fiddler playing, unplugged, in the center of the circle.
> >
> > So, thanks again for everyone's input and encouragement,
> > Brooks
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > > Date: Fri, 27 Mar 2015 03:50:51 -0700
> > > To: callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net
> > > Subject: Re: [Callers] Solo fiddler or recorded music?
> > > From: callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net
> > >
> > > [resting up before the CALLERLAB convention, catching up on some older
> > > messages]
> > >
> > > On Thu, Mar 05, 2015, Neal Schlein via Callers wrote:
> > > >
> > > > So, the moral of the story is that if a caller isn't USED to working
> > with a
> > > > band, live music isn't necessarily going to result in the best
> > experience
> > > > for the dancers.
> > >
> > > My experience as a relatively new caller is that it also depends on the
> > > caller's experience as a dancer. My hearing makes it a bit difficult to
> > > tune into the phrasing of a live band to call at the correct times, but
> > > because I've been contra dancing for so many years (almost exclusively to
> > > live music) I can roughly manage it -- and I know what it's supposed to
> > > sound like.
> > > --
> > > Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6 http://rule6.info/
> > > <*> <*> <*>
> > > Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Callers mailing list
> > > Callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net
> > > http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/callers-sharedweight.net
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Callers mailing list
> > Callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net
> > http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/callers-sharedweight.net
> >
> >
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