On Sat, 29 Jun 2013 01:33:45 -0400, Jack Mitchell wrote: > My goal in the workshop would be to give people tools that they can > use to make sense of at least a large subset of dances with > challenging end effects by trying to come up with the smallest > number of general categories of end effects / coping skills > possible, and avoiding having to give specific instructions for > that dance -- the first time you go out wait out with the lady on > the left, then wait out on the right diagonal, and such as that. > While I strongly doubt that I can cover every possible type of end > effect, I think that it should be possible to cover some general > categories of end effect and to give folks some structure for > dealing with them. I would really like to help the dancers find > the patterns so that they can better cope with end effects when > they come along...
I've also started planning a workshop on End effects, and I totally agree with what Jack is proposing - general rules rather than specific advice for each dance. My first general rule is to stay awake at the end and go where you are needed - assume that the people who are still moving are in the right place and you're not. A very common end effect which no-one has yet mentioned is that standing out for one turn of the dance is enough to reboot many people's operating systems - it's suddenly a totally unknown dance! This is understandable in "Mr Beveridge's Maggot" where the ones and twos do dramatically different moves, but not in most modern American contras where the ones and twos do exactly the same thing. On Fri, 28 Jun 2013 21:42:08 -0700 (PDT), Michael Fuerst wrote: > Dances with challenging end effects have such because of the > interesting stuff within the dances. Dancers will not be > enlightened by the end effects. I'll be doing some of Michael's dances in the session, since he specialises in odd end effects, but I don't agree with what he says above - I've danced at least one of his where I thought "This is perfectly straightforward" and then got to the end and been totally lost! I think dealing with end effects is a skill which needs to be taught, just like contra corners. I'll post a link to my notes when they're ready (though it may not be this year) and ask for further comments. Colin Hume Email co...@colinhume.com Web site http://www.colinhume.com
