A friend and I recently called a few (family style) dances at a little
strawberry festival near us. The day was way to hot to really dance,
so we only did three. The one that worked the best was a Virginia Reel
variation - everyone got to stand around while the top couple sashed
down and up the set. It gave everyone a chance to stand still. Lots
of downtime for people.
On that note, as a dancer I appreciate the little downtimes in contra
dances, especially when it's hot. Here are some of the moves that I
find give the dancers a short breather:
-Allemande 1 1/2
-Men/Women do-si-do
-Ones-only swing
My last thought is that double progression dances should be avoided, so
as to give dancers that 64-beat rest at the top and bottom.
-Seth
On Jul 25, 2005, at 7:05 PM, Tom Hinds wrote:
I have some questions for callers. Now that it's hot, I wanted to
know if
callers think it's a good idea to call a less active program when the
temperatures are high? I'd like to suggest that some moves require
more
expenditure of energy than other moves. So, my second question is, do
you have
any dances that are active but at the same time don't drain the energy
from the
dancers? Would you share these dances?
