Capering & Kickery

October Wanderings

Over the next few weeks I'll be doing three major events in upstate New York; St. Petersburg, Russia; and New Haven, Connecticut.  Here's where to catch me this month:

September 30 - October 2: the 45th Annual Oquaga Lake Folk Dance Weekend, where I will be teaching early 20th century sequence dances of various kinds, from the Veleta to the Lulu Fado and Maxina.

October 7-9: the seventh Anno Domini festival in St. Petersburg, Russia, where I will be teaching nineteenth-century dance, primarily from the first half of the century.  The website in the original Russian is here, for Russian speakers/readers.

In between that trip and the Assembly, I'll be attending (but not teaching at) the Poconos Waltz Weekend on October 14-16.

October 22-23: the ninth annual Regency Assembly, in New Haven, Connecticut, where I will conduct a dance workshop and ball on the Saturday and help host a park stroll, tea, and gaming on the Sunday.  There will be a Regency dance workshop at Vinnie's in Middletown, Connecticut, on Tuesday, October 18th, as preparation for this event.

And finally, on October 29th, there will be a 1970s disco-dance Halloween party at Vinnie's, for which I will serve as DJ and line dance leader.

Overall, don't expect many (any) blog posts this month!

 

Ninth Annual Regency Assembly, New Haven, Connecticut (October 22-23, 2011)

Coming up in just a few weeks, on Saturday-Sunday, October 22-23 in New Haven, Connecticut, is my ninth annual Regency Assembly, an opportunity to try the kind of dances discussed in my posts on the dancing of Jane Austen's era and the Regency era in the context of a formal evening ball.

Saturday's events include an afternoon dance workshop followed by a formal evening ball with live music by Spare Parts, as heard in the film Bright Star and on The Regency Ballroom CD.

Sunday, stroll in the park before retiring to the parlor for tea and Regency gaming, including card games such as picquet and whist as well as board games, dominos, and spillikins.

Both days will be well-supplied with delicious refreshments baked from Regency-era recipes.

Full details and registration information is available at the event website.  Pre-registration cutoff is October 17th; advance payments must be received by that date.  After that, pay at the door, space permitting (attendance cap is 60).  An online payment option via Paypal is also available.

For those in Connecticut: there will be a workshop the Tuesday evening before the Assembly, October 18th, in Middletown, Connecticut, from 8:15-9:30 at Vinnie's Jump & Jive for $8 per person for a sneak preview of the dances for Saturday night.

It's a polka! It's a waltz! It's a contra dance!

I was reading through Elias Howe's Complete Ball-Room Hand Book (Boston, 1858) looking for a nice waltz contra dance to write up when I realized that the one I had in mind looked oddly familiar. 

Take a look at these two figures, appearing on consecutive pages:

COLOGNE POLKA
First and second ladies join hands and polka across and back, (gentleman single on the outside at the same time), first and second gentleman join hands and polka across and back (ladies on the outside at the same time), first couple polka down the centre and back -- first two couples polka quite round each other to places.

BOHEMIAN WALTZ
First and second ladies join hands and waltz across and back, (gentleman single on the outside at the same time), first and second gentleman join hands and waltz across and back (ladies on the outside at the same time), first couple waltz down the centre and back -- first two couples waltz quite round each other to places.

Notice anything unusual?

CD Review: Home Sweet Home

I picked up this 2002 album by the Dodworth Saxhorn Band last year when they were engaged to play for the Remembrance Day Ball I call for in Gettysburg each November.  It's not specifically a dance recording, but there are three labeled dance tunes on it and a couple more that are usable as such.

The Dodworth Saxhorn Band, as the name implies, consists primarily of saxhorns, a marching band instrument with a more mellow sound than a modern brass band.  The saxhorn apparently was particularly popular with Civil War-era marching bands, and the group uses original instruments built between 1840 and 1900 and tuned to a high pitch, nineteenth-century style, for a very authentic sound.  The Dodworth of the band's name refers to the family of New York dancing master Allen Dodworth, who had a notable career as a musician, composer, and bandleader before turning to dance.  The group is modeled on the Dodworth family's own band, founded in 1825 by Allen's father Thomas and reformed in the 1830s by Allen himself first as the National Brass Band and then as the Dodworth Band.

Most of the nineteen tracks on Home Sweet Home are songs or concert pieces from the era, including a short rendition of "Yankee Doodle" and popular pieces like "Goober Peas" and "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."  An exception in this otherwise-period set of selections is "Ashokan Farewell", a modern piece by Jay Ungar which is associated with the Civil War because of its use in the Ken Burns documentary.

But for the dancer, the pieces of most interest are the dance tunes.  These include the familiar "Prima Donna Waltz" and "Cape May Polka", both well-played at danceable tempos.  It's nice to have new versions of these old favorites with such an interestingly different sound.  The third labeled dance piece is the "Jumping Galop", played at a very brisk 150 beats per minute.  While period dancing masters do suggest high speeds for the galop (Dodworth himself suggested 152, and his contemporary M.B. Gilbert listed 144), most modern dancers are more accustomed to around 125, so this tempo may be a bit of a shock.

Two tunes not labeled as such, but usable as slower (around 125 bpm), less driving galops are "Skyrockets" and "Listen to the Mockingbird".  The latter includes mockingbird noises.

The "Dixie Medley Quickstep" is a nifty little medley, but at less than two minutes long it is not a workable length for a Grand March.

While not primarily for dancers, dance music played on authentic instruments is not easy to come by, so Home Sweet Home is worth picking up despite the few dance tunes, and will be even more enjoyable for anyone who likes nineteenth century vocal music.  It is available from CDBaby and a number of other online retailers.  Excerpts may be heard on the band's Myspace page.