Hey All,
Calling my first intentional "experienced" contras evening later this
month. While I've got quite a few suitable dance cards, I'd love to hear
about ones you feel are particularly successful in such a community series
(vs. camp or weekend) setting?
More than glossary yet suitable for no walk through?
Subtly tricky?
Particularly rewarding of on time execution & dancer skill?
Thanks!
Hi, Guys -
I want to collect contras where there is no wait-out at the end of the
line. A dance that comes to mind is Three Thirty-Three, because of the
grand R&L up and down the line. Can you name others? and other figures
that make a no wait-out possible?
Thanx,
Susan [image: 🎶] [image: ☺]
330-347-8155
woosterdance.com
Hi fellow contra callers :)
I was wondering if any of you are planning on going to the Helvetia Hoot in
September?
https://www.clawandfoot.com/#/https://www.facebook.com/events/893468761710760
I'm driving down from Ottawa (11hrs away) with a few friends as it sounds
super awesome. I believe it used to be the West Virginia Dare to be Square?
The event is going to be one of the release parties for the Circle Up Zine
(check out a bit about it here:
https://www.facebook.com/events/805284484476683/?ref=newsfeed)
Would be lovely to know if a few of you might be going too!
Emily in Ottawa
PS - I'll also post this on the trad callers and positional callers lists.
I love the current discussion of AABBCC dances and will use this as an opportunity to encourage the dance composers out there to write more! I began writing them for two main reasons:
(1) I adore the beautiful 48-bar reels and jigs that many bands can play if given the opportunity, but rarely get the chance.
(2) There are choreographic storylines that just can't fit into 32 bars of choreography, but can fit nicely into a 48-bar "story."
With those factors in mind, I wrote Utah Reel which Maia mentioned (turn all four contra corners plus a diagonal hey), Jabberwocky (a hey on the side with three neighbors, far outside the minor set), and Three-Day Weekend (grand right and left all the way through neighbor #5), all findable in Caller's Box. None of those figures would fit cleanly for me into a 32-bar dance, but they work with 48 bars and dancers at challenging/experienced dances can generally handle them. I'm happy to share tune recommendations and teaching tips with anyone who'd like them, for any of those dances. (Thanks to Chris Page for feedback during the composing process for all those dances.)
It's true that, as Bill Olson wrote, dancers need extra prompting nudges to remember that 48-bar dances go for more than 32 bars. But to me, it's worth it to get to dance to Reel Beatrice, or Ragtime Annie, or Reel des Accordéonistes, or lots of other great 48-bar tunes, plus get to do some fun uncommon figure combinations. I'm sure there are other fun choreographic storylines just waiting for their chance to star in a 48-bar dance -- let me know if you write a new one!
Jeremy Korr
Claremont, Calif. / Woods Hole, Mass.
A few people reported that the Caller's Box wasn't working today.
(It looks like the problem started at about midnight Eastern time.
Some kind of networking weirdness at ibiblio.)
It should be working now.
Thanks for the reports!
-Michael
Hi Folks,
I'm going to be leading a series of caller discussions/workshops in the
next while. (This is a new thing for me. I'm very excited as there's always
so much to learn from each other. :))
I'm wondering....
-->Are there any activities that stood out as being really awesome from
caller workshops you've attended/led?
-->Any discussion topics/ways to frame discussions that excited you?
I've been sketching things out and as of right now, I'm really excited to
have a series of questions that prompt discussion among the group. (Maybe
stickies/stickers on poster boards as part of this.) The questions range
from the why of it all, presentation/performance considerations, teaching,
prompting, repertoire, etc.... ... I'm trying to figure out some key
questions to prompt the discussion. Here are just a few of the many prompts
I'm thinking about....
What do you see as the value of trad dances/dancing? What do you get out of
dancing? What do you think others get out of it?
What is your motivation for calling? What do you think you get/might get
out of calling? Characteristics of a great caller? Callers you like (AND
why)?
What do the dancers need in the prompting? (Anything specific for beginner
dancers in particular?)
What need to/should know to know about a dance to call it really well?
What is key in band communication…. At the start of the evening?
Before/during/at end of each dance? At the end of the evening? Before the
day of the gig?
I'll also be creating a framework for safe feedback while we practice
teaching and prompting dances.
Thanks!
:) Emily in Ottawa
I was curious about the origins of the "Brooms/Fan/Roses/Umbrellas" being used as props, and found this.
Looks like others have wondered about the origins of this silliness - but no mention of rubber chickens!
Ben
https://www.kickery.com/2008/04/three-chairs-a.html#more
Three Chairs: A Genre of Civil War Era Dance Games
* Era: America, 1840s into early 20th century
"My friend Patricia asks in email:
Do you know of any documentation for a dance that is known to many as the "hat", "flower", "broom", "paddle", or "fan" dance? It is described as having two lines of people (usually men in one line and ladies …
… He/she looks back & forth between them, hands the item to one of them and sashays or dances down the between the lines with the other person. Sometimes it's done with three chairs, sometimes with no chairs.
I know several dances with most of those names (all but paddle), none of them what Patricia had in mind. The dance she's describing is a variation on several of the mid-19th century cotillion figures also known as "Germans". These were not cotillions in the 18th-century sense of a chorus/verse-structured dance for couples in a square. Instead they were party games with dancing, some of which were quite silly and seem to us today more like children's games than pastimes for a formal ballroom. By the end of the 19th century, the role of these games had evolved from an amusing way to end a ball into the entire point of the evening, and hostesses vied to run the best "Favor-Germans", with elaborate trinkets as game props and party favors for their guests.
American dancing master Allen Dodworth, writing in 1885, explained the nomenclature of these dance games as follows:
> This dance was introduced in New York about the year 1844. At that time the quadrille was the fashionable dance, but was known as the cotillion. To make a distinction between that and this dance, which was known in Europe by the same name, this was called the "German Cotillion;" gradually the word cotillion was dropped, the dance becoming simply "The German."
>
>
The German connection is not fantasy: the earliest definitive source I have for the this sort of dance game is an 1820 manual published in Berlin and does include a version of what I call the "three chairs" genre of figures as part of a larger list of figures under the heading "Cotillion" or "Codillon".
Given Dodworth's dating of their introduction, these games are appropriate for Americans reenacting the mid-19th century (Civil War era) and later 19th century. While many of the games used in Germans were probably in existence earlier (musical chairs, blind man's buff, etc.), there is no evidence of their incorporation into ballrooms of earlier eras outside of Germany. Their history there, to the best of my knowledge, awaits further research.
The hat - or other object - dance as described above is clearly folk-processed. 19th-century dancers would not have lined up like that for a German; they would have waited patiently in their chairs for the dance leader to direct them a few at a time. Sashaying down the room would not have been used; couples would have taken the opportunity to really waltz or polka. Dance manuals from the 1840s onward often contained lists of cotillion figures, sometimes hundreds of them, often identical from manual to manual. I don't pretend to have done a comprehensive survey, but there are clear roots for the hat dance in at least four different Germans, all of which use three chairs as a setup, as shown at right in an illustration from Coulon. Note that the outer chairs face in the opposite direction from the middle one. This is also specified in some of the descriptions below.
All the dancers would be seated in a large circle. The dance leader, or conductor, selects the figures and directs the dancers, choosing a small group (as few as two, depending on the figure) to start each figure, which is then repeated until everyone in the company has had a chance to participate to the extent practical given size, balance of ladies and gentlemen, etc. Each figure is done to music - polka, waltz, and mazurka were common - and involves actual dancing around the room with whatever dance fits the music...."
Hi Colin,
Oh my goodness! Your website is AMAZING!
Pre-pandemic I called a few squares but since then, I've fallen in love
with calling them. I'm also a sucker for history, and have done a bit of
reading of the Northern Junket. I've dreamed of a website like yours that
would have the squares from NJ together. This is SOOOOOOOO great!
What a wonderful way to bring part of that history forward in an accessible
way. :)
Emily in Ottawa
On Tue, Jul 25, 2023 at 1:00 AM <
contracallers-request(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
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> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Colin Hume <colin(a)colinhume.com>
> To: Contra Callers <contracallers(a)sharedweight.net>
> Cc:
> Bcc:
> Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:01:04 +0100
> Subject: [Callers] Squares from Northern Junket
> Northern Junket was a magazine which Ralph Page edited from 1949 to 1984.
> I've now finished copying out the Squares he published there, sometimes
> with my own
> comments and suggestions.
>
> I know some of you dance and call Squares as well as Contras.
> If you're interested, please read my page at:
> https://colinhume.com/instnj.htm
> and let me have any corrections and comments either through the list or by
> email.
>
> Colin Hume
>
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Northern Junket was a magazine which Ralph Page edited from 1949 to 1984.
I've now finished copying out the Squares he published there, sometimes with my own
comments and suggestions.
I know some of you dance and call Squares as well as Contras.
If you're interested, please read my page at:
https://colinhume.com/instnj.htm
and let me have any corrections and comments either through the list or by email.
Colin Hume
