If you get mostly advanced square dancers, Bill Olson called a great contra at Brattleboro that had a mini-grand square on the diagonal. It was cool! You sacrifice the neighbor swing I think, but it was a cool figure.
On Wed, Jun 10, 2015 at 1:52 PM, Aahz Maruch via Callers < callers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote: > On Wed, Jun 10, 2015, Michael Barraclough via Callers wrote: > > > > The regular Phoenix 2nd Saturday Contra is having a contra dance with > > the Desert Valley Squares Club (an LGBT MWSD group). In addition, the > > Desert Valley Squares have been advertising this dance heavily in the > > local LGBT community as part of their recruitment drive. > > > > Any suggestions as to how best to handle this mix (regular contra > > dancers, MSWD dancers and non-dancers) would be most welcome. > > I'd do one, maybe two MWSD tips as demos (assuming you call MWSD). > Otherwise, treat basically the same as any other contra night that has > lots of beginners (maybe with more mixers). The square dancers will be > more experienced than the non-dancers, but they will struggle a bit with > the differences in styling and the phrasing focus (unless they've had > previous contra experience). > > If you have a chance ahead of time, maybe rehearse contra-style buzz-step > swing with the square dancers (definitely make clear that they can do a > walking swing instead). > > You might want to send this to the square dance club, it explains how > contra dances work from a square dancer perspective: > > http://www.tiac.net/~mabaker/how-contra-dances-work.html > > Because gay MWSD almost exclusively uses gendered terminology to > interoperate with straight squares, your choice whether to make this a > gender-free dance (I'd consult with the club). > > You might ping Kris Jensen (gay square caller in ABQ who also does > contra), she may have specific suggestions due to some familiarity with > Desert Valley. > > http://krisjensen.com/ > k...@squarez.com > -- > Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6 > http://rule6.info/ > <*> <*> <*> > Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html > _______________________________________________ > Callers mailing list > Callers@lists.sharedweight.net > http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/callers-sharedweight.net >
