Thank you, Jeff! I would really like for dancers and musicians to kindly and respectfully agree that we speak two different languages, and agree to use ONLY the word "count" to talk to one another across the divide.
Even some musicians don't understand the difference between 4/4, 2/4, 6/8, and 2/2, particularly since folk notation often uses 4/4 where 2/2 is really meant. But I contend it doesn't really matter so long as you know how the tune goes. I'm able to simply disregard my musical training (BMus Oberlin, MMus, New England Conservatory) when faced with music (or musicians) who are happily, blissfully unaware of the traditions of standard musical notation. And dancers! Good lord, not even folk notation can explain the misconceptions about musical terminology. But again, I contend that it doesn't really matter if you can hear the top of the phrase and if you can count to eight. Forget all that A1 and A2 and B1 and B2 business! It's useful to the musicians (so callers who truly understand it can sometimes get a tune back on track that has gone off) but the dance choreography is almost always 8-8-8-8-8-8-8-8. Sometimes the eights have two four-count moves, and sometimes a four count balance is followed by a twelve count swing, but it's really all eights, all the time, in contra dance. All eight WHATs? Why, eight counts, of course. 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8. And even poor lost-soul musicians who don't dance can understand that it's up to them to figure out what note length gets a single count after you walk it through for them. So the word "count" gets us both into less trouble, and means basically the same thing to both groups. As a musician, I might mentally translate "count" into "beat", and as a dancer, I might mentally translate "count" into "step", but I mean exactly the same amount of time in both cases. If anyone is interested in why I think the word "beat" won't do the same job, I'd be delighted to entertain a discussion, but perhaps off-line where we won't leave people scratching their heads and wondering why people even think about such things... M E On Sun, Oct 19, 2008 at 4:56 PM, Jeff Kaufman <c...@sccs.swarthmore.edu>wrote: > On Sat, Oct 18, 2008 at 10:53:32PM -0400, Mark Hillegonds wrote: > > > > There is a mistake in the definition of "count." The article says a > > count is "A count (as used above) is one half of a musical measure, > > such as one quarter note in 2/4 time or three eighth notes in 6/8 > > time." > > > > It would be more accurate to say that a count is one "beat" of a > > measure. For example, in 4/4 time, there would be four counts/beats > > per measure. There are a number of 4/4 tunes played for contra > > dances so say that all tunes are 2/4 or 3/8 time is inaccurate. A > > slightly important mistake is to say that 1 quarter note in 2/4 time > > is a count/beat. It would be a half note, not a quarter note. > > > > You're using "count" and "beat" to mean the same thing. I think I've > mostly heard callers use them for different things. "Beat" is usally > used as a musical term while "count" is a choreography term. A > standard contra dance has 64 counts, and also has 64 steps. The > number of beats depends on what sort of tune the band plays. > > But it's very much messy terminology. Many dancers use them > interchangibly to mean "count" while many musicians use them both to > mean "beat". > > > > > One quibble with the definition of a California Twirl. The > > definition states the convenient hands joined. I think of a > > California Twirl specifically as the gent's right hand and ladies > > left hand being joined. I've heard a couple of callers use "Navada > > Twirl" for the flip situation of having the gent's left hand and > > ladies right hand joined. > > > > I'd be curious to know whether the rest of you use California twirl > > to mean the more general "convenient" hands or the more specific > > "gent's right and lady's left." > > > > I've most commonly heard four different calls for the four different > combinations of man's left/right and woman's left/right: > > man woman figure > --- ----- ------ > R L California twirl > L R Star through > R R Box the gnat > L L Swat the flea > > I've heard people advocate using "twirl to swap" for all cases. So I > would say the wiki's wrong here. > > Jeff > Medford MA > > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- > Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) > > iD8DBQFI+60KPfL7QWqaHTcRAuyaAJ0dbvO55V/vlruv9g3ziKAFw+22egCgyM4f > qmtAYrjuYVjjnjE6xLhwdJs= > =lSC3 > -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- > > _______________________________________________ > Callers mailing list > call...@sharedweight.net > http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers > >
