Contra Callers

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4369 discussions

"Assigning" roles in the beginners' lesson?

by Maia McCormick

Hey there, hive mind, When you're calling larks and robins, during the lesson, how do you a. explain the roles to the new folks, and b. put the beginners into roles for the duration of the lesson? I've seen "try swinging in both roles and see which feels better", I've seen "unless you have a preference, whoever is standing on the right of your partnership is the robin for now", I've seen "pick whichever bird you like better", I've seen "the robin's role is a little easier so do that if you feel less confident"... I'm curious what folks here do and in what kind of distribution, and how you find it works for you in practice. (Please please please let's not relitigate gender-free contra or the bird terms in this thread. If you really must, please make a separate thread.) Swingingly, Maia -- Maia McCormick (she/her) 917.279.8194

1 year, 2 months

Re: "Assigning" roles in the beginners' lesson?

by K P

John Sweeney wrote, in response: "“Some dances have been around since George Washington's time”! Oh! So, you only do the recent stuff :-)" John, have you got some good chestnuts with "hides and hairbones" roles? :) Cheers, Ken Panton

1 year, 2 months

simple 4-face-4 dances

by Allison Jonjak

Hi all, My barn dance series has been doing well with an occasional contra dance added in, and progressions are working. I feel "safer" including contra style progressions as 4-face-4 dances, though, especially when I have a wide age range of dancers. I know "trail buddies" can help the kids point in the right direction each time. Coconut Cream Pie ( https://contradb.com/dances/1548 ) is getting a lot of play lately, but I'd like to have a few more of that style in my deck. It would be nice to have a 4-face-4 both before and after the break, without it being literally the same dance. Any simple favorites? Bonus points if they are a california twirl progression to feel "familiar". Thanks everyone! Allison -- Allison Jonjak allisonjonjak(a)gmail.com allisonjonjak.com

1 year, 3 months

Walk through - Trip to Phan Reel - Cabin Fever 2024

by Timothy Klein

After several discussions with new callers about a lack of dance walk through videos, I've started recording some of mine (when I can remember!). This past weekend (Cabin Fever, Knoxville TN), I had the wonderful help of Jim Crawford to add footage from the floor and to mix in the house audio. I'm sharing that here for whatever benefit it brings folks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQMBy8Q5ft4 Some interesting things happened that changed how I called this dance: - The lines were crowded, so I backed the gents up to suggest that they cross the gent in the next set by the right (overlapping orbits). - There was some confusion about shadows, but it really doesn't matter who that is, so I ignored/squashed questions about direction and just let the dancers muddle into it. - I'm started at B2 in order to put the pass through progression at the end of the dance (making the dance improper.) I do this sometimes for reasons that I don't always recall. I hope these videos prove to be useful. Timothy

1 year, 3 months

A Becket mixer

by Becky Liddle

> On Jan 25, 2024, at 12:00 AM, contracallers-request(a)lists.sharedweight.net wrote: > >>> Late in a regular evening dance a caller recently threw in a contra >> with larks and robins progressing in opposite directions or at >> different rates. Although it was announced as a mixer, it was >> sufficiently unexpected that chaos and discomfort ensued. I'd have >> been happier with that in a workshop setting. "Dance with who's >> coming at you." >> >> David, I'd love to have this dance for uh, scientific purposes and >> certainly not to sow chaos 👀 >> >> >> -- >> Maia McCormick (she/her) >> 917.279.8194 Here is one: Note: I can’t guarantee I have everything right here. I think I remember prepping to call it and then chickening out! :-) ð BECKET MIXER No Use Crying Over Spilled Milk by Chris Weiler Teaching: Note: warn Robins that they’ll feel stuck at ends when not stuck. If there’s nobody on your side to dance with, then dance with the person across from you and face back in LL/RR as usual. Larks triple progress, but robins progress forward 2 and back one so it can feel like you’re stuck when you’re not. Don’t fix it or you will get stuck! A1 BECKET: on side of set w/partner: Partner balance & swing A2 (6) Circle left 3 places & pass thru along the set (8) New neighbor swing B1 (8) long lines forward and back (8) third neighbor (beside you along side of set, who you did NOT just swing) allemande left 1 ½ (there’s an awkward hand-hold switch here: robins, you can make it smoother if you take the lark’s left hand you’re holding in your right hand, and put it into your left hand for the allemande left 1 ½ ) B2 (8) Robins chain (to current partner— then say goodbye) (8) Star left (all the way around) to a new partner Calling Notes: Note: If you’re out at the ends and there’s nobody on your side to dance with, then do the move (whether partner or neighbour) with the person across from you and face back in LL/RR as usual. warn Robins that they’ll feel stuck at ends when not stuck. Larks triple progress, but robins progress forward 2 and back one so it can feel like you’re stuck when you’re not. Don’t try to fix it or you will get stuck! Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7At3Dhq-G0

1 year, 3 months

English/Contra medleys

by Maia McCormick

Hello hivemind, I’m thinking again about an ECD/contra Medley — presumably where you switch from one style to the other every time you change dances, though I am of course open to other ideas. Does anyone have thoughts here? Have you seen the unsuccessfully? Tips on what to avoid or common pitfalls? Thanks for your insights! Maia -- Maia McCormick (she/her) 917.279.8194

1 year, 3 months

Ellen's Green Jig

by Gregory

Hi Folks, I'm teaching a contra dance tonight for a special event. I wanted to double check my sources and came up short on one dance: Ellen's Green Jig. According to my memory, I tweaked this dance years ago to be proper/improper. However, the original I can no longer find. Furthermore, my notes say it was originally by Roy Dommett, the famed rocket scientist morris dancer. Does that make any sense? Does anyone know this dance or who devised it? Thanks! Greg [image] Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. This is filler text that changes the size of the messages I send - an added layer of security for detection and identification of encrypted information using metadata. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. This is filler text that changes the size of the messages I send - an added layer of security for detection and identification of encrypted information using metadata. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. Sent with [Proton Mail](https://proton.me/) secure email.

1 year, 3 months

Suggestions for great recent contra compositions

by Gregory Frock

Dear Colleagues, I will be at NEFFA 2024 calling a session of "the best dances of 2010 and later". I have a pretty good list of nominees, but if anyone wants to add suggestions, or encourage selections of particular dances, I would love to hear them. I am looking for a good variety of geographic origin and work from both renown and lesser known choreographers. Thanks all! Greg

1 year, 4 months

New College Contra / 1st time with 50+ dancers!

by Robert Matson

Hi All, Please join us in celebrating a significant milestone for our college dance: more than 50 dancers this past Friday! Last school year we averaged around 20/dance. Last year's core dancers were seniors. This school year we have been averaging around 10/dance, but our core dancers are mostly freshman. (Yay!) Video clip from the dance: Dance: 'The Flircle." Ellen Hostetter calling. Band: Bobby Fjsh and the Magic River https://youtu.be/TGWzuIk2LTE (For videos, we've promised to obscure dancers' features in order to maintain privacy.) As some of you know, who have met us on-line or in-person, we started our dance from scratch, with all first-time dancers and a novice caller who hadn't done much contra. (That said, our novice caller is a professional educator and researcher whose formative art was ballet and tap). At last Friday's dance, about 80% were first-timers. The other 20% were beginner-level. To share, with the hope that some of you can benefit, we've identified several possible explanations for the high turnout. The primary new effort was that we hosted a pop-up art exhibit in the space, lasting for the 120-minutes for which we had the studio. Long story short, pursuant to our floating the idea in our regular announcement and inviting artists to pin-up, one of our core dancers volunteered to curate a show and spoke with her art professor who, in turn, liked the idea and gave the students credit if they participated. From that, a good 25-30 student artists came with work to pin-up -- or put down -- we had one sculpture -- who had never heard of contra, who may have never put a foot down on a beat, and had no intent of dancing. With encouragement, all but one (due to health issues) joined in for the whole dance. The student who curated has offered to continue creating exhibits and we plan to do this every time. (We dance 2x/month.) We think it was a rogue wave of sorts. Another student, it so happened, on the same eve, got a group of his friends to come, and several students from the outdoors club showed up. And then several of our usual dancers, who we hadn't seen for a while, showed up. And then one of our usual dancers was freaked out by the size of the crowd, she told us, and left. :-) Luckily, a reporter and photographer from the school newspaper also visited on the same eve! So, a wonderful tsunami of first timers. We look forward to seeing how many keep returning. Program: Circassian Circle The Flircle - Intermission, art show, hob-nobbing - Swing workshop Lucky 7 Mixer We did three walkthroughs of each dance and started 10 min. late due to distractions caused by hanging the art show. We dance Larks/Robins. All best, Rob - - - - - - - - - - - Robert Matson Cell: (917) 626-2675

1 year, 4 months

Workshop activities for helping dancers improve their skills?

by Emily Addison

Hi fellow contra callers :) I am wondering if any of you have little activities/exercises that you use to help dancers improve their knowledge/skills of contra dance? I know there's lots of opinions on whether this is even necessary or should be offered. However, I have a few situations where I've got dancers who are keen to improve their skills and I'd like to have various fun ways of doing so. I'd love to hear your ideas! One activity I remember from mannnnny years ago in Ottawa was led by Adina Gordon. She had us form up in contra lines and then she would say 1-2 (maybe 3?) figures. We weren't to dance the figure... instead, simply go to the spot where we would end up after the figure(s). I remember this as being a lot of fun and a great learning experience. I also remember from that same session something about sending some dancers out of the room and teaching the dance to others and then doing the dance. (I don't remember the details.) Thoughts? Any advice/ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! Emily in Ottawa ON

1 year, 4 months

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