For anyone who's fooling around with left swings, in knee-saving workshops
and such...
Margarine
becket: from improper, circle RIGHT ;) 3 places
A1. circle R 3, turn to new Neighbor, swing! (standard clockwise swing)
A2. Long lines forward & (returning) Gents Neighbor roll away along
r to
call it) in place of the B1 and B2 right-hand allemans, transform this into
a dance more suited to seasoned dancers and crowded spaces.
Courtesy twirls,
Tavi
On Thu, Feb 16, 2017 at 11:55 AM, Tavi Merrill <melodiouswoodch...@gmail.com
> wrote:
> Checking in with y'all to share new chore,
Checking in with y'all to share new chore, confirm whether it is
"original," and ask if others have sequences they use for similar intents
and purposes.
Bread
improper
A1. Ring balance; Ladies Neighbor roll away (with a half sashay) along
Ring balance; Gents Partner rollaway across
A2.
If I were of a betting nature…..I would
> bet that the dance was from the 1980’s, maybe 1990’s.
> Linda
>
> On Jan 16, 2017, at 5:20 PM, Tavi Merrill via Callers <
> callers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
>
>
> Dance genealogy question: The figure first appearin
Dance genealogy question: The figure first appearing in "Dublin Bay" (aka
"We'll Wed and We'll Bed," its title in Playford) morphed in contra into a
modified "lines of four down the hall."
I know a version of it from Sue Rosen's dance "Handsome Young Maids," where
dancers facing down take four
Sigh. Why is "join right with right in front, left hands behind the gent's
back, gents walk forward and ladies back up" way more difficult than "join
left with left in front, right hands behind the lady's back, ladies walk
forward and gents back up"? It's not, but
A numerical argument:
Say in
Per Richard's excellent point about separating the courtesy turn from the
chain, an approach i too use, i want to address the related questions of
- lack of attention to chains beyond the beginner level, resulting in
- bad/injurious flourishing, partly due to
- gendered dynamics in the standard
it's easy to collect from this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6LlCUhPwnM;
> Anybody have Marty Fager's "Balance and Bounce" handy?
>
> Many thanks,
> Kalia Kliban
>
>
> --
>
> Subject: Digest Footer
>
> ___
> Callers
suming this workshop is at a gender-free series, but geared to
encourage attendance by dancers who aren't yet accustomed to gender-free
dance? Having danced both roles widely and called a bit of gender-free, I'd
be happy to chat by phone or IM. Feel free to ping me on facebook - Tavi
Merrill
Bradley,
The first and third dances in this video playlist may fit your bill.
>
> "While I am sensitive to cultural issues, until someone comes up with a
> term
> that captures not only the physics of the move, but also the flirtatious
> nature of it, I will probably grimace any time someone uses a different
> term. ...It is more than a figure, it is a figure with an
Precisely. What Jeff says here is to me much more than an aside as it helps
define and clarify my thoughts around the main point i was trying to make.
Dancers are accustomed to swinging for anywhere from 8 to 12 counts (as a
balance and swing is 16, minus the 4 counts a balance takes), thus a
-count swings, which i see as a reciprocal relationship.
On Sun, Mar 27, 2016 at 6:05 PM, Jeff Kaufman <jeff.t.kauf...@gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> On Mar 27, 2016 8:38 PM, "tavi merrill via Callers" <
> callers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
> > like the ripcord
Hola all,
So Amy's followup to her "Is this a new dance" query brought up something
i've been thinking about for a while. (Amy & Tom - i'm collecting it with
Tom's B2 modification and attributing it as Wimmer, variation Hinds.)
A 16-count swing does go on forever. But it is also awesome - and i
I take issue with the term "gimmick." Using familiar moves in new ways is
IMO called "good choreography." If one defines using existing moves in
novel ways as "gimmick," basically every use of petronella turns and waves
after "Petronella" and "Rory O'Moore" is a gimmick.
Originally had a long
Didn't see these mentioned yet (pardon if i missed them)
Ted and Lynn - Rick Mohr
Naked in California - Nils Fredland
Belgian Chocolate - Sargon de Jesus
All Swings Considered - Tom Hinds
i like where this is going. Folks who want to keep the g-word would have to
prove it didn't come from 1620s "unconventional; outdoor" (but we know
where that came from, and from the bohemian sense also where
hipsters/YUCCYs came from though that was some pretty interesting cultural
evolution,
A couple thoughts i left out of the first message:
I suggest "take eyes" rather than "lock eyes" because it's a less
forceful/invasive phrasing and because it mirrors "take right hands," "take
hands four" et cetera. And yes, i've seen others' comments to the effect
that some find eye contact
With regard to the term's offensiveness or lack thereof, i am less
interested in the exact origins of the term's use within ECD than i am in
the implications in pairing the term with that particular move. To be
"gypped" is to be cheated, a term rooted in stereotypes of Romani people as
RPDLW tends to have a different set of expectations than most weekends, to
say the least.
Michael, thanks for putting me on the spot with the "really, would you
ever" question, a question that *could have been asked of anyone who
replied to Maia's stated query about others' thoughts on how to
Of course, the ultimate question with regarding to calling a CC BY-NC dance
at a paid event: is it in fact noncommercial use? What would describe
'commercial use' of a contra sequence, other than republishing it? (It is
my understanding the rich tradition of collecting dances from performers
and
I find "indecent" a rather useful term. At a base level, it at least
suggests the dance is neither proper nor what dancers reflexively think of
as improper. "Improper" doesn't really describe anything either; though
dancers recognize it, and there's a giggly association with the
A quick thought on "backwards becket", which is the starting formation of
one of my dances as well - i tend to think of it as "becket indecent"
since that regularizes the term with other formation terms, implying lady
on the gent's left. The basic list of course - proper, improper, indecent,
Cis, you beat me to it. It's a very simple matter to "select all" and
delete before typing up a reply. Call it good listserv hygiene : ) Thanks
folks
Hi all,
It was a real treat to utilize the lesson plan Stan Fowler and Laura Brown
developed for Glen Echo's Friday night dance. As a caller who's often more
comfortable with experienced crowds than one night stands, it was magic to
watch the simple concept behind this come to life and open a new
Joe Kwiatkowski, you beat me to the punch, dammit. But since i already had
the card in my stack for tonight ;) here are the calls
Bats in the Grange (improper) Steve Zakon-Anderson
A1. Nbr balance & swing
A2. Gents L 1.5, partner swing
B1. Partner promenade 3/4 (until 1s are facing down, 2s up
Thanks to all who responded. It's possible the dance i recalled was Sharon
of the Green (thanks Linda) or Mad Robin Migration II (thanks Jim) - may
never know for sure, but probably one of those!
Hullo comrades,
One night recently i wanted to call a very special dance for a very special
dancer, whose favorite move is the mad robin. I searched through the
hundreds of dances i have in various festival compilations and couldn't
find the one i was looking for.
All i remember is that the
Chris, indeed, panning for gold, trying not to get distracted by diamonds
in the rough...
In response to Greg/Yoyo/Kalia/Aahz comments on my choreography question,
Yoyo is right on with the understanding that down the hall (i was thinking
4-in-line) dances at a basic level are quite easy to find,
Hi "call"eagues,
As a minor-league caller working towards a National-league position, i'm
always on the search for new repertoire. Unfortunately, whenever i peruse
collections - be they callers' websites or books like "Zesty Contras" - i'm
easily distracted by bright, shiny choreography that
Perry brings up a couple things which are often on my mind. As i write
this, i'm thinking there are a few folks out there rolling their eyes or
gritting their teeth at the recent flood of progressive dialogue on this
thread. Bear with me, please...
I consider myself a trans-role dancer (as
Chrissy hits the nail on the head of why there are numerous callers (her,
myself, Will Loving, to name a few) who vehemently oppose the inroads
"lead/follow" terminology is making within contradance. Thanks to mentors
who emphasized that "gent" and "lady" simply described dance roles,
distancing
Re: "First Turn in May", i called it for a beginner-heavy crowd in
Montague, MA recently (about 10 first-timers and several more inexperienced
dancers out of 50 total). Timing on the allemandes didn't seem to be an
issue. One thing i really liked about that dance was the opportunity to use
it as a
120 bpm is generally considered normal - but one of my best dance
experiences ever, with the band "Old Grey Goose" left me both feeling
sublime, and realizing their tempos were on average a little lower than i
was used to. Ralph Sweet has a great thought about tempo - the idea that,
based on the
hored before they became
Perpetual eMotion).
Give the fiddlers my regards!
tavi merrill
- durable, portable, and at least a
little bit classy - other callers have come up with... and where you might
have found 'em.
thanks for sharing the weight!
tavi merrill
This may be slightly off topic, since i know nothing about MWSD, and i
don't have exact tempo figures to share, but an observation -
i've noticed recently that one of the moves in contra dance that is
particularly sensitive to tempo issues is the hey, particularly when
followed by a move like
Rumor had it her first words were "hands four from the top"...
Sue Rosen also called it at the LCFD spring camp last weekend : )
This might seem to play right into "divisive", but hear me out: it's worth
giving thought in the discussion to the reason some contradancers dislike
squares. Now, i speak as a dancer/caller who has had loads of fun dancing
traditional New England squares at Ralph Page Legacy Weekend, among other
To pick up on John's point from this side of the pond, there are plenty of
duple improper dances that end with a partner swing for the active couples.
There are quite a few dances which could be started in either becket
formation or duple improper, allowing further scope in the pairing of dance
Thanks so much to all - Linda, Bob, Michael, Jo, Bill, Jonathan, David -
great suggestions!
So, based on a few favorite dances with distinctive diagonal moves, i
cooked up the idea for a one-hour festival slot themed around
diagonals. Currently, the lineup is Gene Hubert's "Diagonal Dillema", Rick
Mohr's "Ellen's Yarns", Carol Ormand's "Life, the Universe, and
Everything", and Russel
Bob, Linda, David and others - thanks for the fantastic suggestions!
Dorcas, thanks for putting the question out there - i'm sure quite a few of
us with Paddy-related gigs will benefit from the discussion ; )
A couple of other slightly relevant dances based on the cloverleaf and
snake themes -
So i feel a bit silly walking into this discussion with such a simplistic
answer, but - to me it only merits referring to a dance by an alternate
formation if there's absolutely no way to set the dance up as a standard
formation (eg, a becket-indecent). Unlike a dance which starts with a wave
Yeah Beth! I couldn't agree more... the courtesy turn is so underestimated
in how much coordination dancers must have to do it gracefully, and the
regional variation in R through can be befuddling... but heys are so
wonderfully innocuous, provided the ratio of experience levels is
appropriate.
Glad to hear the dance went well! And also glad the input was helpful.
Your report brings up a few things i think are really valuable to remember
(which i sometimes forget!) so i figured i'd toss them out to the list for
further thought:
- if a dance is likely to be challenging for the crowd,
Despite my youth, i may be a codger already... IMO, courtesy is(/should
be!) basic to the dance; style and flourish have their place, and i enjoy
them as well, but not at the expense of courtesy. I think it's possible
(/our responsibility?) as callers to emphasize this point without making
Thanks, Tom - good point re: the variability of "shadow" positions. Even
experienced callers sometimes identify the wrong shadow in a walk-through,
and when dancers get the wrong idea chaos ensues.
On a separate but related note: This raises for me an interesting question:
clarifying the
Sue Rosen's "Handsome Young Maids" and Rick Mohr's "Connectrix" both have a
"cloverleaf" figure, in both cases tied to a down-the-hall. Does anyone
know of dances where the cloverleaf occurs without a down-the-hall?
tavi
I have called it twice thus far; both times the dancers enjoyed the dance -
and the joke implicit in its choreography.
Both times i used it in mixed-level situations, without problems, calling
it as written. IMO it's a really good dance for introducing the "shadow"
concept to inexperienced dancers
I also speak from limited calling experience (4 years, in Maine and more
recently Boston). I do give more programmatic weight to becket dances
towards the end of the halves, and occasionally i'll modify a B part that
already circles left to end with a partner swing.
(I take a fairly conservative
se. I think if we callers are a bit more attentive to the difference
between the two, and take the time to clarify it in walk-throughs, gents
chains of either stripe could be much more familiar and user-friendly to the
dancers and, becoming more common, open more choreographic and programming
ise them,
say they're doing great, and invite a round of applause. Sometimes i sneak
in the suggestion that experienced dancers ask them to dance.
Above all, though: have fun!!! If you're having fun, chances are the dancers
will be having fun too.
David "Tavi" Merrill
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