On 3/18/2014 2:06 PM, Alan Prince Winston wrote:
Rich —
What do you need these for? Class residency? Birthday party? How
old are the kids? Do they want to be there? How long do you have with
them? How important is it that the dances be historically accurate,
and now hat dimensions?
The “Colonial Social Dancing for Children” book is aimed at classroom
teachers and is constructed assuming that you have the kids multiple
times, and has some emphasis on footwork and etiquette. (Period
footwork resembles modern Scottish footwork.) The Heritage Dances of
Early America book isn’t aimed at children and doesn’t help very much
with how things phrase to the tunes. The Cracking Chestnuts book is
really looking at old-favorite contra dances; jn the 1820s and 1830s
the contra dances mostly didn’t look like contra dances as we do them
today. (Footwork, ball of the foot vs. flat feet, no ballroom
swinging, handshake stars not wrist-grip stars,e tc.)
Country dances in America and England aren’t very different at this
point. (Kate van Winkle Keller, with various collaborators, has
reconstructed and published dance collections from American sources
1770s-1790s. Even the “New Country Dances From Topsham Maine” book is
mostly dances published in Englsh sources.).
Quadrilles have come in. Cotillions haven’t gone yet. The Spanish
Dance formation seems to come in (in England) in the late 1820s;
that's more or less Sicilian Circle, and can be fairly accessible.
I've had good luck with easy cotillions (Marlbrouk, George
Washington's Favorite) for kids over 10. For this period you might
also want reels for three, four, and six. Lancers Quadrille comes in
(published c. 1815).
-
On Mar 17, 2014, at 8:11 PM, rich sbardella <[email protected]>
wrote:
I am looking for some period dances that might have been danced in
small New England towns in 1820-1830. Should be easy enough for
children.
Any suggestions?
Also, does any know the steps to "Barrel of Sugar"? Recommended music?
Rich Sbardella
Stafford, CT
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