6 Jul
2009
6 Jul
'09
3:34 p.m.
Tina wrote:
A band asked me to call Sasha as we prepared for their
monthly barn dance.
Seems it was a favorite of that dance community. So I learned it for them and
indeed, everyone was laughing and whooping it up. But warning: I then thought,
how fun! Let's bring this dance into my home contra community too, as a spice
between the line dances -- and was met with the hairy eyeball like you would
not believe. :-p It was very interesting to discover the delicate nature of
dance choice for different crowds. I still want to expand the variety at
regular dances, though - albeit somehow more tactfully in future. Yeah, call
Sasha for that ONS for sure!
I think I'd believe how much of a hairy eyeball you got. There are a lot of
people with very limited views of what ought to happen at a contra dance, and
they're not shy about letting you know. [I once saw somebody yell
"English!"
and refuse to do a bouree balance (not unlike an English setting step) in what
was otherwise a perfectly conventional longways duple improper contra.]
(Wide assortment of *reasons* for not liking what they don't like, and not
being willing to give a chance to what they don't know they won't like. It's
hard to influence the program and the dancer attitude very much if you're not
the main caller, and if your desire to change the direction isn't shared by
other callers. But anyway, if half of 'em sit down and grumble for squares,
getting them to do a dorky (in a good way) scatter mixer to non-Celtic,
non-old-timey, non-New-Englandy music is going to be a challenge.)
-- Alan
--
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Alan Winston --- WINSTON(a)SSRL.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU
Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, not SLAC or SSRL Phone: 650/926-3056
Paper mail to: SSRL -- SLAC BIN 99, 2575 Sand Hill Rd, Menlo Park CA 94025
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