Yesterday I called my second family dance, which went pretty well! I've stopped calling regular contra dances because I don't enjoy it very much anymore, but these two have been a lot of fun and I'm up for doing more.
As usual we played with an open band, and this time Nora decided to play bass:
Despite the flyers, no one from the kids classes showed up. They've had much more luck specifically inviting one or two friends. On the other hand, it probably didn't help that it was father's day.
Here's what I called, which borrowed a lot from last time. Since that was almost two years ago, though, I think it's fine!
La Bastringue, variant where you keep your partner. Same dance I started with last time, and as before I didn't do a walk through and called while I danced. It went well!
The Low-Backed Car. Same as last time. Another good dance!
Heel-Toe Polka. This is the only dance I called where you don't keep your partner, but I told people it was fine to dance tandem. This dance is half-length, so it's important to make sure the band plays AB.
Water break. It was hot!
Bridge of Athelone. We had slightly too many couples for the music at ~10, but it worked ok and we didn't get off the music.
The Blob Dance. Would have been slightly better with more dancers, but it was fine.
Sasha. This one Lily called; her first time! She did great! Probably the most popular dance we do, and the only one I have kids requesting by name.
Water break. We like to end Sasha unreasonably fast, so it was welcome.
Jacob's Potato. This dance has a whole-set circle in a lonyways dance, which is fun.
Galopede. I hadn't been planning to do eight dances in an hour, but the timing worked out for it. This was slightly too close to the other longways dances we'd done; I should work up a dance that is a bit more distinct.
It was a good time!
Comment via: facebook