Basic Becket question - Contra Callers

11 Sep 2024

Hi all- here in Halifax, to keep things simple for our beginner-full/generally unskilled
group, we never dance in Becket formation these days.

But Luke's original post has suddenly got me "seeing the light" about how I
could use simple beckets as a way to get beginner people dancing in contra lines without
worrying about the complexities of ejection and getting ppl to remember to change places
when ejected.  (And also avoiding the strange feeling of how the dance symmetry changes
when you switch from moving up the hall to down the hall or vice versa).

So I'm going to test it out with my group...

But I realize it's been a while since I danced a Becket and I forget some of the basic
mechanics.

I just tried googling but could not easily find the info I was looking for...

so-- apologies for asking such a basic question here-- but I trust it will be an efficient
way to find an answer :)

First off just a bit of info on my plan--
, I plan for now to try out only very simple Beckets where everyone comes back to their
home place after every figure.

So i'll be explaining the progression as sliding CCW (I'm gonna go with CCW
progression only, for now) 2 places, until you are in a new duple.
(we may play on simple variations of this like going forward in lines towards the old
couple, and veering backwards towards the new couple as in the first dance Luke presented
here).

I understand that if there is an odd number of couples, then every time the dance runs
through, a couple will be ejected, either at the top or the bottom.

My question is-- if there is an EVEN number of couples, then are two couples ejected, top
and bottom, every second time??

Or, does the progression just involve a big fast turn for the people at the top and bottom
of the giant oval, so that they always meet a new couple, every single time?

thanks all for your help :)

Kat k