22 Jun
2013
22 Jun
'13
12:58 a.m.
Jim,
OMG what a great post. You have so hit the nail on the head and presented
it so eloquently.
I believe good dancers who are community oriented (rather than dance gypsy
jaded, as Joelaine so brilliantly points out in her home page post on
gmail) are going to be just fine w/ the caller choosing appropriate dances
for the crowd. Just 2 days ago I called a relatively new dance series that
vacillates between mostly experienced one month to having a large group of
first timers showing up the next. This Wed. there were a number of first
timers who were retirement age and beyond. I could have kissed all the
experienced people for their patience, understanding, and having a great
time even though the first half of the program was pretty tame compared to
usual. I'm happy to say, the new people were having a blast and wanted to
do it again. Phew!!
Paul
PS I called several dances that night that have sat unused in my file for
several years.
I think we can keep two things in mind at the same
time:
(1) Dancing with the feeling that you know what you're
doing is usually more fun that milling around with
a feeling of confusion. Things like choosing
dances appropriate to the crowd, teaching clearly,
and building dancer's skill can be good because
they add to the fun.
(2) What's even less fun than milling around in confusion
is milling around in confusion and feeling that the
caller and/or the other dancers are upset about it.
Stuff about dance skills and "doing it right"
shouldn't take precedence over fun.
As callers we can aim both to keep the amount of confusion
low and to set a gracious tone towards whatever confusion
may still arise. (Doing the opposite of both these things
is unfortunately easy: Just pick inappropriate dances,
teach and call them poorly, and then bark at the dancers
when the inevitable confusion arises.)
--Jim
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