I like to try to feel out the crowd when deciding when to end a dance. It's been suggested by many callers that the excitement of dancing a contra is almost like a bell shaped curve. The excitement goes up and then comes back down. The trick is to end just before the excitement starts to drop off.
Tom [email protected] wrote: > Send Callers mailing list submissions to > [email protected] > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > [email protected] > > You can reach the person managing the list at > [email protected] > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of Callers digest..." > > Today's Topics: > > 1. Card boxes and Dance ending (David Giusti) > 2. Re: Card boxes and Dance ending (Peter Amidon) > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Message: 1 > Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 13:30:04 -0500 > From: David Giusti <[email protected]> > Subject: [Callers] Card boxes and Dance ending > To: [email protected] > Message-ID: <[email protected]> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > > Hello, > So most callers have dance cards, and all dances have to be ended at > some point. I have my ways of doing it, of course, and I've asked a lot > of callers about theirs, but haven't found anything I'm quite happy with. > > Basically, how do you organize your box of dance cards and why do you > like it that way? > > And, > How do you figure out when to end a dance? Of course finish with all > couples in, but how do you decide when it's about time to end it? > Some callers simply set a timer, or count a number of times through, or > end when couples have come back to where they started. What do you do? > Does anyone try to gauge the energy of the dancers on the floor and end > when it seems right? > > Thank you very much, > David Giusti > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 2 > Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 14:25:05 -0500 > From: Peter Amidon <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [Callers] Card boxes and Dance ending > To: "Caller's discussion list" <[email protected]> > Message-ID: <p06230950c1d02f6221db@[192.168.1.100]> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" > > David Giusti wrote: > > >Hello, > >So most callers have dance cards, and all dances have to be ended at > >some point. I have my ways of doing it, of course, and I've asked a lot > >of callers about theirs, but haven't found anything I'm quite happy with. > > > >Basically, how do you organize your box of dance cards and why do you > >like it that way? > > Hi David > > I am very happy with my database way of organizing dances. I do not > have dance cards. I do have a comfortable working knowledge of > using databases; I use them in all of my work as a freelance musician. > I use Panorama, but I would recommend anyone starting out to use > Filemaker Pro. > > The short story is that I keep all of the dances on a database. The > actual dance is recorded in eight 8-beat fields: > > A1a > A1b > A2a > A2b > B1a > B1b > B2a > B2b > > Other fields, other than the obvious, include the date that I entered > the dance, > whether it is in my current repertoire, what the difficulty level is, whether > I've ever called it. Of course there are a lot of other fields you could > make: > e.g. swings: how many and with whom, etc. > > I can easily select out dances that I want to memorize to build my repertoire; > I export the dance instructions and a separate page that has just the > titles and > choreographers names. I drill and practice the dances until I can remember > the > whole dance just from the title. > > To prepare for an evening contra dance I might print out a big list > of dances from > which to choose from which to make the dance list for that night. > > Once I have chosen and sequenced dances for that evening, I number > the dances I've chosen > in the database from, say, 1 - 11, put them in order, and export the > dances, the > choreographer's name, and instructions for the band (what kind of > tune - that is another > field I have in the database), and put it all on one sheet that I > print out and give to > the musicians ahead of time so they can more easily plan the evening. > I print, for > my own use, the instructions to all the dances I am calling that > night. They fit > on two sides of one sheet; I usually only use this if I am calling new dances > that are not yet ingrained in memory. > > I also print out a list of a bunch of alternate dances I might call in case > I need to vary from the planned program. These dances are already memorized, > so I do not need to print out the dance instructions to these. > > For a festival or dance weekend where I am calling a lot, I print out a couple > of booklets of my current dances. One page has all of the titles and > authors listed, > and I sort the dances into three categories of difficulty. The other > pages have > all of the dances' along with the dance instructions. Again, this is an easy > import from the database; I just choose which dances and fields to export and > then format the resultant text in MS Word. > > Best, > > Peter > -- > Peter Amidon > [email protected] > 20 Willow Street > Brattleboro, VT 05301 > 802-257-1006 > cell: 917-922-5462 > http://www.amidonmusic.com > http://www.dancingmasters.com > > I have never been lost, but I will admit to > being confused for several weeks. > > -Daniel Boone > > ------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > Callers mailing list > [email protected] > http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers > > End of Callers Digest, Vol 29, Issue 1 > **************************************
