15 Apr
2023
15 Apr
'23
5:39 p.m.
Laurie,
I started getting the feeling that we've been over this subject before, and I found
thread about "Beaumont Rag" started on 2022/04/27 either by you or by some other
"Laur" with the subject line "Need help fitting to a tune". I'm
forwarding below a message I sent on 2022/04/28.
In my message I included links to recordings of several renditions of "Beaumont
Rag" that I thought were quite suitable for contra dancing and also to several
versions that I said didn't fit the standard structure of a contra dance. About the
latter group, I wrote:
... If you listen to any of them and try counting
along from 1 to 16 over and over, you'll find that at some point you get to
"8" or "4" and the music signals strongly that it's time to start
again at "1".
Did you ever try that? If not, I *strongly* recommend that you try it now and let us know
what you think.
If your local band is playing a version of "Beaumont Rag" that includes 12-bar
or 10-bar parts, then it not only won't work well for the general run of contra
dances, but it also won't work for the specific dances that some folks here have
recommended based on the tune title.
If you can determine for sure that (as I'm guessing) the phrase lengths in your local
band's version of the tune are the problem, or if you can definitely pinpoint some
other reason that what they're playing isn't working for you and for other local
callers and dancers, the question remains whether there's anything you can do about it
besides ask them not to play the tune for dances you call.
Perhaps you could try getting advice from some other local musician(s) whom you trust to
have a solid understanding of what works for contra dancing. (Ask them nicely; thank them
profusely; offer to pay their gas money and/or treat them to dinner; ...) A solid dance
musician might be better able than you to identify specific things about the band's
rendition of the tune that are causing problems. The members of the band might be more
receptive to advice from a respected fellow musician than from a caller. And your musician
friend might be able to advise you about how to approach the band in a tactful way that
won't immediately ruffle their feathers and put them in a mood where they just
don't want to hear whatever anyone wants to tell them. Or they might know enough about
the personalities of the people involved to recognize whether any attempt to broach the
subject would be like walking into a minefield and you might as well forget it.
Good luck.
--Jim
Begin forwarded message:
From: jim saxe <Jim.Saxe(a)gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Callers] Need help fitting to a tune
Date: April 28, 2022 at 12:49:37 PM PDT
To: Contra Callers <contracallers(a)sharedweight.net>et>, Laur <lcpgr(a)yahoo.com>
Cc: Bill Olson <callbill(a)hotmail.com>
Laur,
It's hard to describe stuff about music in words and be sure of being clear, so
I'm going to illustrate my remarks by citing some recordings.
First, there's at least one version of "Beaumont Rag" that's a
perfectly fine contra dance contra dance tune. Check out these videos. (Times in
parentheses tell when the band switches into "Beaumont Rag" from another tune.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pG0i8NTYGvc (4:08)
[Note added 2023/04/15: The preceding video in no longer available. I believe all
the others I've cited in this message still are. --js]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOOYAMcYVBg
(5:28)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynafcljHXhk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13PQT9ubOdc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArLulDsc-fg
All the music in these six videos strikes me as quite suitable for contra dancing. In the
ones that give a good view of the dancers, they don't seem to be struggling. Even when
you can't see the dancers, you can tell by the sound that things are going well. In
particular, you won't hear any callers who sound like they're sweating bullets
trying to keep the dance together.
The versions of the tune in the videos above certainly aren't note for note
identical, and some bands put in a fair amount of variation from one round of the tune to
the next, but they all stick closely to the same basic phrasing.
If your local band plays "Beaumont Rag" and it doesn’t work for the dancers and
it’s agonizing for the callers, then I wonder what they're doing that's different
from what's happening in the videos above.
Bill Olson wrote:
... there are SO many ways Beaumont Rag is
played. Not all of them are 32 bars long. and it is often played as a "show off'
tune at Bluegrass festivals, i.e. REALLY FAST!!!
The tempos in the videos above range from about 111 to 127 beats per minute. Illustrating
Bill's point about people sometimes playing real fast, here's a recording I found
at a beat or two above 140:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3HxHClfJso
And here are some examples, at various tempos, illustrating Bill's point about not
all versions being 32 bars long:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNhcKJTW9Hg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2IRu8quLRs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NB8IPHdiXo&t=1347s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WRCyqaNxas
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQeNPeQpZJY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKdAupCMDPw
In fact, none of these six is entirely in 8-bar (16-beat) phrases. If you listen to any
of them and try counting along from 1 to 16 over and over, you'll find that at some
point you get to "8" or "4" and the music signals strongly that
it's time to start again at "1".
If your local band's version of "Beaumont Rag" is like any of those last
six, then regardless of the tempo it won't be a good fit for any standard-length
contra dance and it won't be a good fit for "Balance the Star" or "Anna
Turn's Five" or other dances that people have been suggesting, either.
Another thing that could be going wrong is that there's something about the
band's style of playing for that particular tune that somehow obscures the phrasing.
Take a listen to this guitar version of "Beaumont Rag" played with undeniable
skill by Mark O'Connor:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJuXNiybth0
I _think_ it's mostly (perhaps entirely?) in 8-bar phrases, but there are places
where, at least for me, it's a struggle to keep track. And I don't think it's
just on account of the high speed. It's something about the ornamentation. That sort
of playing could be great for a concert, but at a contra dance, I think that even if the
dancers could dance to it, a lot of them would find it more work than fun. (Possibly,
however, it could make all the difference in the world if another band member were giving
the dancers rock-solid phrasing.)
Bill also wrote:
the tune is pretty much fun if played AABB at a
reasonable tempo. ...
Returning to my opening observation
It's hard to describe stuff about music in
words and be sure of being clear,
let me offer a final word of caution. If the issue turns out to be that the band plays a
"crooked" version of "Beaumont Rag", then even _if_ your relationship
with the band is such that you could appropriately suggest that a different version would
work better for contra dancing, and even _if_ you could get them completely sold on the
idea, and even _if_ they were not merely willing but eager to try it (all VERY BIG
"if"s), I can almost guarantee (without going into the details) that saying
"AABB" would _not_ be an adequate way to describe the version you're
suggesting.
I hope some of this is helpful.
--Jim