The late Larry Jennings, who did the booking for the Thursday Concord MA series for some time used the "no, and if you are interested, I can tell you why".   When asked, Larry was honest (blunt) because that was the way he was.  He was probably more critical of callers than bands, given his expertise and interests. Applicants deserve being handled with honesty, but do remember they are people.  If I were handling booking, my refusal would be on the lines of "we don't think that what you offer is consistent with our vision of our series and the personality we want to project at our evenings."  What they have to offer might be perfectly fine for another series. You need to do your research and be able to back up your position by making every effort to see the performer(s) in action before you form an opinion.  If you can be encouraging, or helpful in a specific way, that would be good. ("You've got issues with tempo control", "You always seem unprepared and make a lot of mistakes").

I was the booker for a dance for a bunch of years and saying no was one of the more challenging responsibilities that came with the role. It's hard because you are basically evaluating someone's creative effort, something they are presumably quite hopeful and invested in. When turning down a band or caller, I say be gentle and somewhat easy in your reply. It's like dating; the reasons one person may not want to go on a second date are rarely "reasons" so much as impressions or intuitions. The situation can be reversed as well--inquires to bands or callers to come play can go unresponded to, or met with "be in touch after the new year" type vaguery that eventually become clear they are trying to gently say no without being harsh, and frankly I think that works. To Don's point about burning bridges, I think you have a sense pretty quick if there's a promising spark there, even if it is early in a band's career, and if there is that spark, I say act on it. Cheers, Dave On Tuesday, May 5, 2015, Donald Perley via Organizers < organizers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote:

I think how you answer depends somewhat on your intentions as a booker. Some people are simply booking their series according to whatever process they have in place. For some dances, the booking agenda is a collectively decided process, with many or all of the board members weighing in on who they want booked in a given cycle. (And perhaps re. who they never want booked, or never again want booked.) For other dances, it's entirely the decision of the booking person, who's been entrusted with that job. In any case, it's more about the desires of the committee members and it's also more about getting the job done however the committee wishes. Other people feel more of a responsibility to the performers who are requesting to play or call for their series. Perhaps a need to be honest/forthright, perhaps a desire to cultivate growth of the performers, etc. Or maybe wanting to be the ones who "discovered" the next great caller/band. Or they may feel a need to be "fair" to all performers. But it's more performer-centric booking. Others may feel a responsibility to their dancers. For example, they may know that a given caller has skills with newcomers but doesn't have the chops for calling complex dances efficiently. Or vice versa - superb with dance weekend types but haughty or ill-equipped to call for newcomers, unskilled dancers, or children (who comprise 50% of your crowd.) Or maybe the musicians are more into themselves and their cool arrangements than the dancers - playing tunes that are hard to follow or dropping beats or getting off the AABB phrasing while they're in jazzy improv mode. Or maybe they're just not skilled, and your dancers need strong players. For these organizers, the dancers' needs will guide their booking practice. In all cases, I don't think anyone needs to explain why they're not booking a particular performer, beyond something like "Sorry, there's not room in the schedule for you right now" or "The committee has given me their priorities, and when we want to book you, we'll be in touch." If a performer aggressively questions you or insists that you ought to let them call/play for your series, you can always choose to give them more specific information as to why not, but frankly, I've never had success with that. Instead it seems to lead to back & forth, arguments, etc. And as a performer, if I am told "no", then I'm not going to argue. I just move on. Really, what all of us performers need to know is that the booking is up to the people organizing the dance. It's the organizers' decision. Period. If we as performers don't like what they're doing, we can organize our own dances, or we can perform somewhere else where the organizers do want to book us, or we can go into our room and cry. But it's not our prerogative to tell dance organizers who they should book. And honestly, sometimes that's simply the arbitrary whim of the bookers. Which I think is fine. If organizers want to book a given performer and not-book another, well, who am I to question them? They're doing all the work. They should get to decide. But that's just my perspective. :) I love this list because we all get to learn from the perspectives of others! Chrissy Fowler Belfast ME