The following are all 64-bar dances. The first is modern and for 3 in a line. The 2nd is a 4-facing-4 in a double sicilian circle and the others are square sets. The gender roles are virtually identical in all of them.
CORNISH SIX HAND REEL DANISH DOUBLE QUADRILLE CUMBERLAND SQUARE EIGHT GOATHLAND SQUARE EIGHT LA RUSSE QUADRILLE Michael Barraclough www.michaelbarraclough.com -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Alan Winston - SSRL Central Computing Sent: Friday, June 25, 2010 9:38 PM To: Caller's discussion list Subject: Re: [Callers] Gender role switching and 64-bar dances Will Loving wrote: > Will Mentor and I have been talking the possibility of making a true 64-bar > dance that either uses a 64-bar tune or twice through of a standard 32-bar > tune. It opens up some interesting possibilities and challenges around > making a dance that's twice as long but that people remember, get into the > flow of and enjoy. > There are longer dances - 42, 48 and 64 bars - but not many that I'm aware > of. I'm interested to know what other folks experience has been about > writing and calling longer dance sequences. I think this may be something > some dancers are ready for, though I would try it before the break rather > than at 11pm! Over in English-dance-land, 64-bar longways dances (usually AABBAABB) were common in the early 1800s (as were triple minors). What's happened in the dance revival is that those 64-bar triple minors have been adapted into three-couple-set dances (which is, incidentally, where Ted Sanella got the idea for triplets.) Dances like "Prince William" and "Fandango". The conceptual chunking in those 64-bar sequences was pretty high. ("Prince William" has "cross over one couple", "double crossover mirror hey", "contra corners", and "lead out at the sides", which were all knwon figures in 1800, so it was really only four chunks for 64 bars.) Anyway, I can't think of any English dance that was published as a 64 bar longways duple or triple and was revived as one. The closest I can come is "Wakefield Hunt", a 48-bar triple-minor, triple-progression, which you don't have to play a million times through for everybody to get to be active. 64-bar perils: More figure takes longer to teach. Takes twice as long to iterate through dance, and if it isn't symmetric people may feel cheated if they don't get to do the "better" role. Band has to play longer or you get fewer times through the dance. I like the idea of trying 64 bars for four-face-fours where you might need the time to get into or out of square formation and still want to do a figure of some interest. In longways, I'd consider starting with double or even triple progession so that you have a longer sequence but everybody gets to be 1s and to encounter many other dancers along the way. -- Alan -- ============================================================================ === Alan Winston --- [email protected] Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, not SLAC or SSRL Phone: 650/926-3056 Paper mail to: SSRL -- SLAC BIN 99, 2575 Sand Hill Rd, Menlo Park CA 94025 ============================================================================ === _______________________________________________ Callers mailing list [email protected] http://www.sharedweight.net/mailman/listinfo/callers
