Re: [Callers] Alternating corners dances - Contra Callers

27 Jun 2010

On Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:01:26 -0400,
Will Loving &lt;will(a)dedicationtechnologies.com&gt; wrote:
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  Actually, I like Alternating Corners despite the fact

 the caller has to keep calling. And my perception 
 is that modern dancers generally like it too compared 
 to a more traditional corners dance like Chorus Jig 
 where you have to wait to be active (and which may 
 never happen if sets are long). For a dance like this,
 sometimes all you need is a Lisa Greenleaf style 
 minimalist prompt such as quietly saying "ones" and 
 "twos" just to keep things going. I think the alternation 
 makes the dance more interesting and I don't see it 
 as my purpose to have every dance send dancers off 
 into that la-la, altered zen state (that I nonetheless
  cherish as a dancer...) 
...
  Will 
There are at least a few alternating corners dances out there --  the one that I call has
a circle left immediately before the ones and twos need to figure out who is active, so as
a caller it is easy to see who to prompt

If there are couples at the top of each set who are not in a circle-of-four, it's the
twos' turn; if the top of each set has a full circle-of-four, then it's the ones

At some point in the dance, I have essentially dropped the calls except for prompting
"ones" or "twos" to be active -- and occasionally I get distracted and
drop that as well, but the dancers always knew what to do when that has happened

Mark Widmer