I've noticed that dancers' natural tendency is to balance towards the hand that touches first in these situations, which is consistent with what you report. Should the rest of the dance be truly worthwhile in fighting that tendency, I would opt for doing a balance forward and back in this situation. Otherwise spin the wheel of dance and pick one that matches custom? On Nov 8, 2017 2:07 PM, "Maia McCormick via Callers" < callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote:

Balancing F/B would be my approach in that scenario. Also a good opportunity to reinforce giving weight, since that particular movement done repetitively could irritate the shoulder joints if dancers are not keeping some tension in the arms. ________________________________ From: Callers &lt;callers-bounces(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; on behalf of Mac Mckeever via Callers &lt;callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; Sent: Wednesday, November 8, 2017 8:16 PM To: callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net; Maia McCormick Subject: Re: [Callers] Balancing LEFT in a wave? sorry - I missed that you said the alle L followed the balance - in that case - I think the first bal should be left. To bal R & then L and then turn by the left just sounds awkward. Mac Mckeevr On Wednesday, November 8, 2017, 2:09:46 PM CST, Mac Mckeever &lt;macmck(a)ymail.com&gt; wrote: It depends on what will happen after the balance Can we see the rest of the dance? Mac McKeever On Wednesday, November 8, 2017, 1:07:46 PM CST, Maia McCormick via Callers &lt;callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote: Recently called a dance with an allemande R into long waves, balance wave, allemande L. Because of personal preference, I taught the balance as "balance left, then right", but cuz I didn't teach it all that clearly, the dancers defaulted back into balancing right first, and enough tricky stuff was happening in the dance that I didn't wanna correct them in flight. I'm just wondering: do others agree that a balance left makes more sense / flows better in this context, or is this a weird personal preference? In your opinion, does the flow of the balance left outweigh its potential unidiomaticness? Cheers, Maia _______________________________________________ List Name: Callers mailing list List Address: Callers@lists.sharedweight.net<mailto:Callers@lists.sharedweight.net> Archives: https://www.mail-archive.com/callers@lists.sharedweight.net/

In my experience the momentum of an allemande right automatically takes one either to the right or forward. Same goes for an allemande left: momentum takes you to the left or forward. A balance left just doesn't flow after am AR, because if you have a good connection with your allemande you're already pulling to the left a bit. That leaves you nowhere to go, left-wise. SO! I agree with the multitudes here: make the balance F&B. -Amy On Nov 8, 2017 11:07 AM, "Maia McCormick via Callers" < callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote:

I was in a dance with a similar sequence just last weekend. Please bear in mind I'm piecing together memories from the middle of a dance weekend. The caller was either Mary Wesley or David Eisenstadter and I can't recall enough context to decide who it was. The part of the dance I remember went like this: ladies 4 steps in, balance wave R, L gents in as ladies out, balance wave L, R two gents allemande L half way, swing neighbour I'm pretty sure I danced gent for most or all of this. I thought that balancing left felt fine. It didn't seem to be too unidiomatic, and it did make the allemande left better. Some parts of the line were a little shakier on the left-first method but overall it worked quite well. It helped me that the caller pointed out that the balance was toward the gent in your current foursome first -- "you're still working with that neighbour". In your case, it sounds as if the waves are where you meet a new neighbour (or perhaps a shadow), and describing it as your first interaction with that person might help make it feel more idiomatic to balance toward them. (But as others have pointed out, the allemande right before the balance is another wrinkle to consider.) Peter On Wed, 2017-11-08 at 14:07 -0500, Maia McCormick via Callers wrote:

Although I basically agree with Yoyo, I state it slightly different: The direction of a balance should always consider what happens after the balance. Note that the direction of movement of an allemande is forward. Then (from physics) the connection of the hands accelerates the forward motion into a circular motion. But recognizing that the initial direction of motion in either a left or right allemande is forward. Thus, following a wave balance with any allemande suggests a forward and back balance. ~Erik Hoffman Oakland, CA From: Callers [mailto:callers-bounces@lists.sharedweight.net] On Behalf Of Yoyo Zhou via Callers Sent: Wednesday, November 8, 2017 1:03 PM To: Maia McCormick &lt;maia.mcc(a)gmail.com&gt; Cc: callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net Subject: Re: [Callers] Balancing LEFT in a wave? For flow, it depends what comes after the balance. If it's followed by an allemande left, you'd be better balancing left. Allemande right: balance right. Walk forward: balance forward and back. Box circulate: right and back. But getting dancers to balance left - except as the second half of a Rory O'More-type figure - is hopeless, in my experience. It's my vote for "hardest move in contra dancing". So I'll say "balance forward and back" in such circumstances. Yoyo Zhou On Wed, Nov 8, 2017 at 11:07 AM, Maia McCormick via Callers <callers@lists.sharedweight.net<mailto:callers@lists.sharedweight.net>> wrote: Recently called a dance with an allemande R into long waves, balance wave, allemande L. Because of personal preference, I taught the balance as "balance left, then right", but cuz I didn't teach it all that clearly, the dancers defaulted back into balancing right first, and enough tricky stuff was happening in the dance that I didn't wanna correct them in flight. I'm just wondering: do others agree that a balance left makes more sense / flows better in this context, or is this a weird personal preference? In your opinion, does the flow of the balance left outweigh its potential unidiomaticness? Cheers, Maia _______________________________________________ List Name: Callers mailing list List Address: Callers@lists.sharedweight.net<mailto:Callers@lists.sharedweight.net> Archives: https://www.mail-archive.com/callers@lists.sharedweight.net/