Contra Callers

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[Callers] Sit-in musicians welcome at 4/30 Cape Cod, MA contra dance

by Robert Golder

In addition to developing calling skills, some of you may also be developing your dance band instrumental skills. If so, you're invited to bring your instrument and join the band at a fifth Saturday contra dance sponsored by the Falmouth Fiddlers Association. Saturday, April 30, 2005, 8:00 - 11:00 pm, North Falmouth Congregational Church Hall, 155 Old Main Street, North Falmouth, Massachusetts. $6 admission. More info about this event, and travel directions, at http://www.schoonerflagpoles.com/DanceFF.html More info about Falmouth Fiddlers Association at http://www.schoonerflagpoles.com/falmouthfiddlers.htm Falmouth Fiddlers Association, 508-563-9494, falmouthfiddlers(a)yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------- Robert Jon Golder 164 Maxfield Street robertgolder(a)comcast.net New Bedford, MA 02740 (508) 999-2486 voice

19 years, 7 months

Fwd: Open caller night, Gorham NH

by Marlena Schilke

Please post We are starting up our 2005 contra dance series in Gorham, New Hampshire this Saturday, April 9, at 7:30 p.m, The callers we were hoping to get are going to NEFFA or elsewhere that evening, so we are having open caller night. If you would like to come, great. If you know of any callers just staring out, and want to practice, let them know. It will be an informal event. Local musicians, "Shelburne Addition" will be playing. Let me know if you can make it. Marlena BabZ Schilke Director, Chapel Arts New England www.chapelartsne.com Chapel Arts is located on Route 16, facing Gorham Town Common, at the intersection with Route 2, 10 miles north of Mt. Washington. Overnight accomodation available.

19 years, 7 months

RE: Head Of The Bed - Nils Fredland

by Jeffrey M. Petrovitch

Dear Chris: Head Of The Bed by Nils Fredland is my favorite becket dance of all time. There are few dance with three swings in them that feel so good and so natural in the dance, and of course the finally roll away into your partner arms is perhaps one of the most brilliant transitions into a swing that has ever been written. I first heard the dance called be Nils Fredland himself at the Guilding Star Grange in Greenfield Ma, Labor Day Weekend 2004. So after this, I brought this dance to the Nelson dance, where it is called from time to time. If I remember correctly, I believe in A2, it is actually a promenade not a right and left through. I really think that the promenade is perhaps one of the gems in the dance, which goes to enhance the connection between the dancers. I would check with your sources about the dances, but I am 99.9% sure that is a promenade. Well, as always good luck with your calling. Thanks, Jeff Petrovitch -----Original Message----- From: callers-bounces(a)sharedweight.net [mailto:callers-bounces@sharedweight.net]On Behalf Of callers-request(a)sharedweight.net Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2005 10:05 AM To: callers(a)sharedweight.net Subject: Callers Digest, Vol 6, Issue 8 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: 1. New Voices, Flurry and VFW (Chris Weiler) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2005 13:02:44 -0500 From: Chris Weiler <chris.weiler(a)weirdtable.org> Subject: [Callers] New Voices, Flurry and VFW To: callers(a)sharedweight.net Message-ID: <42220B44.5020007(a)weirdtable.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well, it's been a busy couple of weeks, and boy is my body letting me know it. I've been laid up with a cold the last couple of days. So here is what's been happening with the calling side of my life (I guess I don't need to warn you by now that this is going to be a long e-mail): New Voices The New Voices dance was quite a success. All of us (Seth Seeger, Jenna Watson, Cortni Frecha, Nathaniel Jack, Mark Jones and myself) did very well. We had a good crowd (I estimated 60-70 people, Mark probably has a better count) of experienced dancers. We also had great music by Mike Ames, Lissa Schneckenberger (sp!) and Bruce Rosen, who were a delight to work with on stage. My own personal breakthrough that night was that it was the first time that I felt comfortable on-stage. Instead of my nervous energy making me hesitant, I directed it into my calling. It was a great feeling. I called two of my favorite dances that I hadn't called before: Mary Cay's Reel and 333-33. I knew that 333-33 was going to be a challenge, and it was. I worked hard with a form to work out the words (which I created first). The form I used is attached if people are interested. Then I practiced (mostly in the car) calling into a tape recorder. The prep work really paid off at the dance. Dance Flurry The next weekend was the Dance Flurry in Saratoga Springs, NY. This is one of my favorite dance festivals with lots of great dancing, workshops and great people. There were 4 callers workshops during the festival and each had their own focus. The first was Joseph Pinmentel's workshop. He talked about the 3 stages of being a caller: the first is where you're learning the basics (call timing, word choice, parts/structure of the music, etc.), the second he called "flight time" or practice time, and the third I think he called the "process". The third stage was the focus of the workshop. The "process" he was referring to was the cycle of feedback and learning that happens when you're calling regularly. Specifically he put it in terms of the observation cycle: take an action, observe the results, decide what you think about the results, and back to the beginning with taking another action. The part that he observed that most callers had with this cycle was that the feedback was hard to filter away from the junk around it. For example when someone comes up to you after a dance and says: "you called a dance without a neighbor swing. Your calling stinks." His suggestion was that you look for the kernel of good information in any feedback you get. In the example, you take away the information that calling a dance without a neighbor swing made a dancer unhappy. Then you can decide if you're going to call a dance without a neighbor swing the next time without the defensive reaction to the statement. It also means that you can handle the situation better because you can honestly thank the person for their useful feedback and ignore the rest. Of course this is harder than it seems. The rest of the workshop we got up and danced and had different people calling the dances. Then we sat down and made observations and Joseph helped us pick out the kernels of good information in the statements. The funniest moment in the class was when one of the people in the workshop made an observation about a session earlier in the day where the caller didn't run the dances long enough. The observer didn't realize that the caller at that session was Joseph. 8^) You'll see by the lengths of my descriptions that this was my favorite workshop. The next workshop was Rick Mohr's. He focused on the basics of timing and word selection. He talked about timing the words to music in order to end the call at the correct moment. He had some great handouts for this and we all practiced with a fiddler. On Sunday, the first workshop was Ralph Sweet teaching singing squares. He talked about the differences in patter calling and singing and the kind of prep work necessary for singers. Coordinating with the band seems to be the most important one. If you don't practice it, then most likely you won't be able to be flexible with the calling to make sure that the dancers are promenading at the chorus. He has published a nice book full of squares and music that has some great material in it. The last workshop I was late for, since I was having great fun at Rick's Squantras and Contrares session. Peter Amidon was running a workshop where he reviewed a handout with a few basics about calling, dance selection and responsibilities. He then opened the floor to questions and discussion. Most of the questions had to to with resources like where to find dances to call and e-mail discussion groups like ours. I have included a scan of Peter's two sided sheet. VFW After the New Voices dance I was very surprised to receive an e-mail from Sue Rosen inviting me to call at the VFW as part of NEFFA night (a multi-caller evening that happens 3-4 times a year). I was floored. I was nervous. I said yes (how could I say no?). Being a regular dancer at the VFW, I know what a demanding venue it is. I requested that Sue put me in the first slot (1st dance of the evening with the first and second after the break). Then I had to find dances that would go over well there. I knew that one of my dances after the break would be either Mary Cay's or 333-33 since they're fun dances and I already had the calling and teaching worked out for them. I remembered a recent discussion on trad-dance-callers about "Easy yet interesting" dances that I could use for the first dance of the evening, but I was at a loss for the last one. The digital voice recorder that I had been using to collect dances had gone through the washing machine in my shorts the weekend before, erasing about a dozen dances that might have done the job. I spent the whole flurry collecting dances, but they were either too hard or too easy for the VFW. It wasn't until the last session that I danced on Sunday afternoon that I found just the right dance for after the break: Nils Fredland's Head of the Bed. For those who are interested, I have put it at the end of the e-mail. So I had 3 days to prepare after I had my dance selection for the evening. I had a few other things going on in my life, so I didn't prepare as much as I would have liked. On top of things, I was running flat out all week and got hit hard with a cold on Thursday. So I was pretty miserable when I showed up at the VFW that night. At this point I would like to praise the nasal decongestant spray that I bought at the last minute. It kept my nose and throat clear through the evening and allowed me to call. The evening is a haze to me, though. Because of the snow, Linda Leslie wasn't able to make it that night. For a while, it looked like it was going to be Bob Golder and myself. Erica Weiss showed up a dance or two before she was scheduled to go on. Sue called Rick Mohr and he was able to come and call a couple of dances during the second half. This pretty much blew the schedule out of the water, so I ended up calling the first two dances of the evening and the first after the break. I called The Casbah Queens by David McMullen (which I got off the trad-dance-callers list) and Forgotten Treasure as my first two dances. Then I called Head of the Bed as the first one after the break. All of which went over well. My teaching on Head of the Bed didn't go as well as I wanted it to (I was reaching the limits of energy and medicine), but the experience of the dancers made up for it and the dance was a success. Great music by Lise Brown, Dave Langford and Bruce Rosen combined with good material and lots of experienced dancers made up for any mistakes I might of made that night. Thankfully, my fuzzy head that night made it impossible to be nervous about calling at the VFW. A few people came up to me afterwards and mentioned that they didn't even know that I was sick until I told them. One of the unfortunate things about getting sick was that I had to turn down all of my favorite dance partners as they came up to ask me to dance while I was sitting out. Epilog I have also attached a handout from Tony Parkes' workshop at the Ralph Page weekend for your enjoyment. Once again, I'm hoping that you are enjoying these e-mails and that those of you who are thinking about taking the leap into calling are inspired to take another step. All the best, Chris Weiler Head of the Bed Nils Fredland Becket A1 Slide Left, Cir. L 3/4 w/new neighbors Neighbor Swing A2 R&L thru Ladies Chain B1 1/2 hey Shadow Swing B2 LL fwd & bk Gents roll Shadow away Partner Swing

19 years, 7 months

Gorham, New Hampshire new venue

by Marlena Schilke

Callers wanted. I'm starting up a new series of traditional New England dances here at Chapel Arts New England in Gorham, New Hampshire, about 8 miles north of Mount Washington. We hope to have a dance the second Saturday of each month, April through October. We have a group of local instrumentalists getting ready to play, and need callers. We are open to visiting groups also. I realize NEFFA is a big draw, but I was wondering if anyone is available for April 9. So far May, June, July, September and October are also open. Chapel Arts New England is a former Methodist Church, and the parsonage next door is available for visiting musicians and/or callers to stay, if they like, overnight. --Marlena Schilke Director, Chapel Arts New England www.chapelartsne.com cellphone 857-472-2869 messages 603-466-2129

19 years, 8 months

Open Mike Calling Opportunity, Sat. March 5

by Robert Golder

The Medway Contra Dance series, at Christ Episcopal Church on School Street in Medway, Massachusetts, will sponsor an Open Mike evening on Saturday, March 5, 2005, 7:30 - 10:30 pm. This is the second of Medway's open mike evenings that I have MC'd. The first evening was a great success, introducing four people to their very first experiences in calling contras for dancers. I have had far less response this time around from people who would like to get behind the microphone. So now's the time to talk to me if you'd like to participate! Contact me if you're interested and we'll discuss the dances you'd like to call. Medway is a small dance venue, a true community dance where anybody and everybody may show up to dance - young and old, brand-new and experienced dancers. Your dance choices should be at an easy to moderate dancing skill level. The band will be Heathen Creek (this is a change from earlier posted information). For more information about the Medway dance, including the 2004-2005 schedule and directions to the hall, go to: http://www.contradancelinks.com/medway.html ---------------------------------------------------- Robert Jon Golder 164 Maxfield Street robertgolder(a)comcast.net New Bedford, MA 02740 (508) 999-2486 voice

19 years, 8 months

New Voices, Flurry and VFW

by Chris Weiler

Well, it's been a busy couple of weeks, and boy is my body letting me know it. I've been laid up with a cold the last couple of days. So here is what's been happening with the calling side of my life (I guess I don't need to warn you by now that this is going to be a long e-mail): New Voices The New Voices dance was quite a success. All of us (Seth Seeger, Jenna Watson, Cortni Frecha, Nathaniel Jack, Mark Jones and myself) did very well. We had a good crowd (I estimated 60-70 people, Mark probably has a better count) of experienced dancers. We also had great music by Mike Ames, Lissa Schneckenberger (sp!) and Bruce Rosen, who were a delight to work with on stage. My own personal breakthrough that night was that it was the first time that I felt comfortable on-stage. Instead of my nervous energy making me hesitant, I directed it into my calling. It was a great feeling. I called two of my favorite dances that I hadn't called before: Mary Cay's Reel and 333-33. I knew that 333-33 was going to be a challenge, and it was. I worked hard with a form to work out the words (which I created first). The form I used is attached if people are interested. Then I practiced (mostly in the car) calling into a tape recorder. The prep work really paid off at the dance. Dance Flurry The next weekend was the Dance Flurry in Saratoga Springs, NY. This is one of my favorite dance festivals with lots of great dancing, workshops and great people. There were 4 callers workshops during the festival and each had their own focus. The first was Joseph Pinmentel's workshop. He talked about the 3 stages of being a caller: the first is where you're learning the basics (call timing, word choice, parts/structure of the music, etc.), the second he called "flight time" or practice time, and the third I think he called the "process". The third stage was the focus of the workshop. The "process" he was referring to was the cycle of feedback and learning that happens when you're calling regularly. Specifically he put it in terms of the observation cycle: take an action, observe the results, decide what you think about the results, and back to the beginning with taking another action. The part that he observed that most callers had with this cycle was that the feedback was hard to filter away from the junk around it. For example when someone comes up to you after a dance and says: "you called a dance without a neighbor swing. Your calling stinks." His suggestion was that you look for the kernel of good information in any feedback you get. In the example, you take away the information that calling a dance without a neighbor swing made a dancer unhappy. Then you can decide if you're going to call a dance without a neighbor swing the next time without the defensive reaction to the statement. It also means that you can handle the situation better because you can honestly thank the person for their useful feedback and ignore the rest. Of course this is harder than it seems. The rest of the workshop we got up and danced and had different people calling the dances. Then we sat down and made observations and Joseph helped us pick out the kernels of good information in the statements. The funniest moment in the class was when one of the people in the workshop made an observation about a session earlier in the day where the caller didn't run the dances long enough. The observer didn't realize that the caller at that session was Joseph. 8^) You'll see by the lengths of my descriptions that this was my favorite workshop. The next workshop was Rick Mohr's. He focused on the basics of timing and word selection. He talked about timing the words to music in order to end the call at the correct moment. He had some great handouts for this and we all practiced with a fiddler. On Sunday, the first workshop was Ralph Sweet teaching singing squares. He talked about the differences in patter calling and singing and the kind of prep work necessary for singers. Coordinating with the band seems to be the most important one. If you don't practice it, then most likely you won't be able to be flexible with the calling to make sure that the dancers are promenading at the chorus. He has published a nice book full of squares and music that has some great material in it. The last workshop I was late for, since I was having great fun at Rick's Squantras and Contrares session. Peter Amidon was running a workshop where he reviewed a handout with a few basics about calling, dance selection and responsibilities. He then opened the floor to questions and discussion. Most of the questions had to to with resources like where to find dances to call and e-mail discussion groups like ours. I have included a scan of Peter's two sided sheet. VFW After the New Voices dance I was very surprised to receive an e-mail from Sue Rosen inviting me to call at the VFW as part of NEFFA night (a multi-caller evening that happens 3-4 times a year). I was floored. I was nervous. I said yes (how could I say no?). Being a regular dancer at the VFW, I know what a demanding venue it is. I requested that Sue put me in the first slot (1st dance of the evening with the first and second after the break). Then I had to find dances that would go over well there. I knew that one of my dances after the break would be either Mary Cay's or 333-33 since they're fun dances and I already had the calling and teaching worked out for them. I remembered a recent discussion on trad-dance-callers about "Easy yet interesting" dances that I could use for the first dance of the evening, but I was at a loss for the last one. The digital voice recorder that I had been using to collect dances had gone through the washing machine in my shorts the weekend before, erasing about a dozen dances that might have done the job. I spent the whole flurry collecting dances, but they were either too hard or too easy for the VFW. It wasn't until the last session that I danced on Sunday afternoon that I found just the right dance for after the break: Nils Fredland's Head of the Bed. For those who are interested, I have put it at the end of the e-mail. So I had 3 days to prepare after I had my dance selection for the evening. I had a few other things going on in my life, so I didn't prepare as much as I would have liked. On top of things, I was running flat out all week and got hit hard with a cold on Thursday. So I was pretty miserable when I showed up at the VFW that night. At this point I would like to praise the nasal decongestant spray that I bought at the last minute. It kept my nose and throat clear through the evening and allowed me to call. The evening is a haze to me, though. Because of the snow, Linda Leslie wasn't able to make it that night. For a while, it looked like it was going to be Bob Golder and myself. Erica Weiss showed up a dance or two before she was scheduled to go on. Sue called Rick Mohr and he was able to come and call a couple of dances during the second half. This pretty much blew the schedule out of the water, so I ended up calling the first two dances of the evening and the first after the break. I called The Casbah Queens by David McMullen (which I got off the trad-dance-callers list) and Forgotten Treasure as my first two dances. Then I called Head of the Bed as the first one after the break. All of which went over well. My teaching on Head of the Bed didn't go as well as I wanted it to (I was reaching the limits of energy and medicine), but the experience of the dancers made up for it and the dance was a success. Great music by Lise Brown, Dave Langford and Bruce Rosen combined with good material and lots of experienced dancers made up for any mistakes I might of made that night. Thankfully, my fuzzy head that night made it impossible to be nervous about calling at the VFW. A few people came up to me afterwards and mentioned that they didn't even know that I was sick until I told them. One of the unfortunate things about getting sick was that I had to turn down all of my favorite dance partners as they came up to ask me to dance while I was sitting out. Epilog I have also attached a handout from Tony Parkes' workshop at the Ralph Page weekend for your enjoyment. Once again, I'm hoping that you are enjoying these e-mails and that those of you who are thinking about taking the leap into calling are inspired to take another step. All the best, Chris Weiler Head of the Bed Nils Fredland Becket A1 Slide Left, Cir. L 3/4 w/new neighbors Neighbor Swing A2 R&L thru Ladies Chain B1 1/2 hey Shadow Swing B2 LL fwd & bk Gents roll Shadow away Partner Swing

19 years, 8 months

Chorus Jig

by Bob Isaacs

19 years, 9 months

Nelson 1/31

by Chris Weiler

19 years, 9 months

New Voices dance at the Scout House

by Chris Weiler

Hello Friends, For those who haven't heard yet, Mark Jones has organized a wonderful event for new callers to try their stuff. At the Scout House! We had a meeting Sunday night to try out our material and it's going to be great! Personally, it's a thrill to be calling while David Kaynor is playing since I learned how to dance at his Friday dances in Greenfield years ago. Come out and support us if you can! Chris Feb 13, 2005 (2nd Sunday) - Scout House 7:30 PM "New Voices: New Callers" Seth Seeger, Chris Weiler, Nathaniel Jack Jenna Watson, Cortni Frecha, Mark Jones (Sue Rosen coordinating) Lissa Schneckenberger, fiddle David Kaynor, fiddle Bruce Rosen, keyboard Flyer:www.cds-boston.org/american/images/new_voices.pdf

19 years, 9 months

magazine article describes a caller's debut

by Robert Golder

_HomeGallery_ magazine has just published my article "Contra Dancing is Back in Full Swing." The article is part of a continuing series called "Off the Beaten Path" ("designed to take readers to places and activities they might not otherwise know about in our richly diverse region" [southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island]. As such, the article provides an overview and history of contra dancing, tells the reader why contra dancing is so enjoyable, and lists venues where interested readers may go to dance. I note this for sharedweight.net subscribers because the article begins and ends with descriptions of Seth Seeger's calling debut at the East Sandwich Grange on Cape Cod a few months ago. I can send JPEGs of the three-page article to any of you who'd like to see it, or I can just send the text in an e-mail. I'd like to share two quotes from Linda Leslie and Amy Larkin, which close the article. Both women are responding to how they feel after Seth's debut as a caller. Linda - "Seth, and other young people like him, are the future of our dances. It is thrilling to see young adults develop into the next generation of new callers, musicians, and dancers." Amy - "This represents the very best of our Yankee heritage. It's traditional New England culture, still alive and growing, and being passed along to the next generation. It's participatory, not passive. In these times, it is marvelous to focus on joy through art, through dance and music shared with others." .... Bob ---------------------------------------------------- Robert Jon Golder 164 Maxfield Street robertgolder(a)comcast.net New Bedford, MA 02740 (508) 999-2486 voice

19 years, 9 months

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