2 Sep
2012
2 Sep
'12
3:21 p.m.
I was calling for the Bay Area Queer Contra series last night, at their
season-opener dance in Oakland, and they are both blessed and challenged
by having a huge group of beginners at almost every dance. They're
enthusiastic and ready to have a good time, but need a lot of guidance
and fairly simple material. I was noticing last night (and I'm a newish
caller with a small stock of dances still, but working on fixing that)
that a large percentage of the easier dances all feature either long
lines forward and back, or lines of 4 down the hall, or both. This
makes it a challenge to keep variety in the program.
When you're calling for an inexperienced group, do you still try to
limit the number of LL F&B and 4-in-line dances, or do you not worry
about it so much? There are just enough experienced dancers in this
particular community that I was trying to keep the program varied for
them, while still trying to keep it really accessible to the new
dancers. Had it been a completely brand-new crowd I would have felt
fine with a lot more repetition of figures from dance to dance, to
increase the comfort and familiarity of the material. But as it was, I
was stuck in that middle place, trying to satisfy a wide range of
experience levels. The eternal challenge...
Kalia
2 Sep
2 Sep
3:37 p.m.
I would probably try to avoid multiple lines of 4 down the hall, but LL
F&B can actually be a really nice "reset" for new dancers. "All
together
now" moves like that can go a long way towards helping a set pull itself
out of chaos.
Jack
On 9/2/2012 3:21 PM, Kalia Kliban wrote:
I was calling for the Bay Area Queer Contra series
last night, at
their season-opener dance in Oakland, and they are both blessed and
challenged by having a huge group of beginners at almost every dance.
They're enthusiastic and ready to have a good time, but need a lot of
guidance and fairly simple material. I was noticing last night (and
I'm a newish caller with a small stock of dances still, but working on
fixing that) that a large percentage of the easier dances all feature
either long lines forward and back, or lines of 4 down the hall, or
both. This makes it a challenge to keep variety in the program.
When you're calling for an inexperienced group, do you still try to
limit the number of LL F&B and 4-in-line dances, or do you not worry
about it so much? There are just enough experienced dancers in this
particular community that I was trying to keep the program varied for
them, while still trying to keep it really accessible to the new
dancers. Had it been a completely brand-new crowd I would have felt
fine with a lot more repetition of figures from dance to dance, to
increase the comfort and familiarity of the material. But as it was,
I was stuck in that middle place, trying to satisfy a wide range of
experience levels. The eternal challenge...
Kalia
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4:43 p.m.
On 9/2/2012 12:37 PM, Jack Mitchell wrote:
I would probably try to avoid multiple lines of 4 down
the hall, but LL
F&B can actually be a really nice "reset" for new dancers. "All
together
now" moves like that can go a long way towards helping a set pull itself
out of chaos.
I was noticing that last night, and that's a good distinction to draw
between the 2 figures. Also, oddly, the clap in the petronella of Tikka
Tikka Timing (or is it Tica Tica? I've seen it both ways) was a good
waypoint. I did mention that leaving the clap out gives you a better
opportunity to reform the ring before the balance, but the clap slowly
crept back in during the course of the dance, and as the clapping
increased, so did the energy level and the cohesiveness of the dance. I
had to admit that in this case it added to the dance rather than detracted.
Kalia
5:50 p.m.
I thnk there are an assortment of figures in contra dance that don't
really count against your variety budget.
(Kinda like if you put out an array of sandwiches people don't complain
that there's no variety because they
all have bread in them.) It's pointless to patrol your program removing
duplicated instances of balances, swings,
allemandes, right?
I think long lines is pretty much in that category, and that you can
also have a lot of circles, stars, and heys, and quite a few ladies
chains and r&L thru before they get tiresome. (Although I personally get
a little bored if I get several dances in an evening where the last
four bars of B2 are a ladies chain to make the progression work.)
(And I agree with Jack, and with you, that long lines make a
reset/waypoint/moment-of-poise, and most dances
need one of those so that everybody can get in synch. )
My issue with down the hall four in line is that there needs to be room
to do it, which most places I call means
it only really works early or late in the program, and it's too much to
do twice in a row, so I now end up doing
it no times or one time in an evening.)
(I used to be annoyed by the Petronella clap, but given that I now
rarely hear the whole hall hit a balance at the same time, I'm happy to
hear everybody in the room synched precisely up on *something*, and this
is a synch point that even new dancers can pick up by osmosis more or
less instantly.)
-- Alan
On 9/2/2012 1:43 PM, Kalia Kliban wrote:
On 9/2/2012 12:37 PM, Jack Mitchell wrote:
I would probably try to avoid multiple lines of 4
down the hall, but LL
F&B can actually be a really nice "reset" for new dancers. "All
together
now" moves like that can go a long way towards helping a set pull itself
out of chaos.
I was noticing that last night, and that's a good distinction to
draw
between the 2 figures. Also, oddly, the clap in the petronella of Tikka
Tikka Timing (or is it Tica Tica? I've seen it both ways) was a good
waypoint. I did mention that leaving the clap out gives you a better
opportunity to reform the ring before the balance, but the clap slowly
crept back in during the course of the dance, and as the clapping
increased, so did the energy level and the cohesiveness of the dance. I
had to admit that in this case it added to the dance rather than detracted.
Kalia
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3 comments
3 participants
participants (3)
-
Alan Winston -
Jack Mitchell -
Kalia Kliban