[Back to Reine's Bio] [Back to main dance page] Contradances
for the Flying Trapeze |
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Reine's Dances
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I wrote my first few dances the first year I started dancing. Most of these were highly unconventional, wildly experimental pieces that I wouldn't dare inflict on folks now, even at a camp workshop. In the past ten years, the tried and true choreographical fruits I dare to share below have grown out of my desire to utilize especially pleasing figures and transitions I'd experienced in others' compositions. My short-term memory for even the best dances tends to go blank as soon as the dance ends and I'm thanking my partner. The best I can do is to recall choice fragments later on, and to weave them into "new" (if there is such a thing) flowing dances. I don't own many books of dancesthat's mainly because much of what's in most of them is stuff I wouldn't care to dance myself. And I find collecting dances at dances interferes with my socializing much too much! Before I get into the dances themselves, let me share a few notes about my calling-card notation. What you'll see below is the "script" system I've developed over my 13 years as a callerthe last nine of those as the house caller of the monthly series in Chico, CA. I don't try to memorize every dance in my repertoirethere are just too many of them! Typically, I have at least one eye on the crowd and part of the other on my card as I do the walk-through and the initial prompting. Mostly, I look at the crowd, but I keep the card in view as a matter of security. This is true whether I'm tethered to the stage or dancing with my headset microphone. If the dancers haven't memorized the dance after a few times, then at least I have (for the moment, anyway). I use scripts with my cards. I've found that composing a script well in advance takes care of the most difficult aspect of prompting, deciding how to present the dance to a group that might or might not have a large percentage of new dancers. Scripts become especially valuable when I've been overly busy all week and have barely found enough time to program the evening. The Capitalized words or syllables denote where the beats of the music fall, i.e., where the emphasis of my voice goes. The X's denote "silent" musical beats. The periods show where the musical phrase actually begins, and (much like the bars on sheet music) these are NOT counted. The periods occur in the middle of the lines because the calls are timed to end just before the musical phrase begins. They provide a quick way to double-check on the appropriateness of my prompts when I write them out, since all I have to do is add up the number of capitals and X's between each pair of periods. Writing my cards out with a first-time-through script on 4x6 index cards gives me the opportunity to work out something euphonious, something akin to a patter style, only without a bunch of dorky filler like "swing your partner round and round, every which way but upside down, till the hole in her head makes a whistling sound" that may sound cute the first time or two but then becomes tedious to listen to forever after that. One of the goals of a contra caller is to get her/his voice out of the way as soon as possible, but this need not be an all or nothing challenge. The full scripts I'm giving you as examples are most useful with crowds where there is a high percentage of beginners and perpetual beginners. Each one details exactly what I can say the first time through that will render the figures into cogently clear prompts for less-sophisticated dancers who are still learning to anticipate the beginning of each musical phrase and who take more than a split-second to respond to a prompt. Then, each time I call a given dance through, I endeavor to pare down the number of words I say, paying close attention to how well the beginners pick up the slack. For example, "hands
four circle left" soon becomes "circle left" and then becomes "circle"
as the dancers indicate they are beginning to memorize the sequence of
figures. Meanwhile, I start dropping the calls for those figures that
are most easily remembered in a given sequence, since dancers tend to
learn some parts of a given dance sooner than others. The more sophisticated
the crowd, the sooner my prompts simplify and drop out. Generally speaking,
the calls immediately after the swings are the last to go! I tend to make
the calls for figures just after a swing somewhat longer, to help bring
folks (particularly beginners) out of their swing-trance in time to do
what's next. I've found that using these techniques enables crowds with
high percentages of beginners to do (and enjoy) the kind of intermediate
and advanced dances that inspire experienced dancers. |
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Unfinished Business
(December 1999) duple improper © Reine Wonite
1999 One evening, I was poring over my cards in search of Really Good dances that I hadn't called recently. One of my criteria for a Really, REALLY Good dance is that it contains a neighbor swing as well as a partner swing. But after I'd pulled out a bunch of "unused" dances that fit that criteria, it seemed that most of them accomplished this by separating the neighbor swing from the partner swing with a circle left three quarters and nought else. Boring! Boring! So - naturally - I set to imagining other ways to get around to swinging everyone that still flowed and progressed and all that. To make a long story short, I came up with the following two dances, then I called both of them at the two gigs I did that weekend, to favorable reviews. In fact, I'll venture to say Unfinished Business is my most exciting dance yet. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 | Someone
NEW Allemande Left . X X Once and a Half Two Women Chain to yr Partner . X X Courtesy Turn |
A2 | Women Start
a Halfway Hey . Women bythe Right Neighbor bythe Left Men bythe Right Swing yr Partner . X X Not too Long |
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B1 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . Three Quarters till the Actives face UP |
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B2 |
Face yr Partner Pull
bythe Right . The One you Swung Pull bythe Left |
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Watch out for end effects during B1, B2, and as the dance starts over in A1! Couples out neutral at the end of B2 have to be crossed over bythe middle of B1, but their real challenge is keeping up with the rapid succession of faces after they swing their previous neighbor. It helps them to know it is always their partner they reach for across the set at the beginning of B2, always the person they've just swung to pull by next (women turn left, men turn right along the lines), but it might take a little recall to recognize their "current" neighbor from A1 and A2 (whom they haven't swung yet) for the allemande right (mercifully, there is a wee bit of slack in the choreography at this point, for this very reason), and a little courage to trust that the next person they allemande is someone new. This dance flows beautifully, but it really, really moves! The swings are eight beats each and don't allow slack before the next figure. It's important to emphasize the need to anticipate the end of the musical phrase. If you have any doubt about the crowd's collective ability to do this dance, be sure to make them aware of which side of the set they'll be swinging their partners. If the dance starts to fall apart, skip the half-hey call and call the partner swing a bit early. Chances are, you'll save the dance, and your dancers will be thrilled that they were able to keep going until they got into the flow of it! The title refers,
of course, to the fact you don't get to swing your neighbor until the
NEXT time thru the dance. Regarding this initially counterintuitive "regression",
Betsy Gordon of Sacramento sez, "It seems like it's not going to
work, but then it DOES!" Russ Kalen of Chico sez, "During the right-hand
allemande, it's fun to say to your current neighbor, 'I'll be back!' "
During the second walkthru, just as the dancers pass thru to their old
neighbor in B1, I'll say to them, "Well - look who's here!" |
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Balance Points
(December 1999) duple improper
© Reine
Wonite 1999 As you might have guessed, this title is a reference to my Other Life as an acupuncturist, as well as the featured choreography. Somewhat surprisingly, there's plenty of time (ten beats) to get around twice in the gypsy -- assuming the floor's not too slick. After debuting it in Sac'to, I changed it from a regular once-around gypsy because (to non-ECDers, anyway) it lingered a bit overlong, and I could see some of the dancers invoking the right of folk process to make it twice. I didn't have my headset mike in Sac'to, but I danced it in Chico the next night -- and I confirmed the advisability of making the change. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Pass Thru Balance
the Next . X X Pull Past |
A2 |
Back tothe OLD Balance
aGain . X X Swing awhile. |
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B1 |
Women tothe Center
Balance NOW . X X Pull Past |
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B2 |
Left hands In for
a Left hand Star . X X X X |
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Funny how there's
less opportunity to feel awkward while directly in someone's face when
the two of you are sufficiently in motion. Before I changed the gypsy
to twice, I noticed dancers would go around each other once, then find
themselves nose to nose at a dead stop for what seemed an eternity before
going back to their initial neighbor for that second balance. This demonstrates
a major difference between (modern) contra and ECD, since in the latter
it's not unusual to *make* the figures fit the musical phrasing, whereas
in contra there seems to be a trend toward dancer expectation that each
figure takes a specified amount of time as well as space. I get the impression
MWSD is even more so along in that trend. No judgments, just an observation. |
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Turning Joyce (October
1997) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1997 I wrote this dance for Joyce Miller, a dancer in Sacramento, CA. It's based on my favorite figure in square dancing: the star promenade with a butterfly whirl to change the gender at the hub of the wheel. The title derives from a hotshot embellishment of the transition to the partner swing, originally described to me by Russ Kalen, who worked it out with Joyce one evening at the bay area square-n-contra series in El Cerrito. Russ likened the man's experience to starting a lawn mower. As for this woman's experience, turning into a swing felt so good, I decided to showcase it with a dance of its own. The original version had a standard butterfly whirl at the end of A2, but folk process proved a double whirl makes for a better ride. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Long Lines Forward
and Back . X X X X |
A2 |
Grab yr Partner Star
promeNade . X X ALL the way Round X X |
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B1 |
Women catch Right
. X X Halfway Back Twirl yr Partner |
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B2 |
Women pull By. Swing
yr Neighbor X X |
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In preparation for this dance, be sure to have the sets s-t-r-e-t-c-h down as they'll want plenty of room to keep whoever's outside on the star from colliding with the adjacent minor sets. In teaching, I tell the women to make sure they have their left arm under their partner's right arm as they go into the star promenade at the beginning of A2. That way, when it comes time to swing, the woman simply drops her arm to her side, and this allows her partner to turn her clockwise into his arms, the man pulling on the woman's right hip for leverage. A quick demo is advisable. Hotshots will want to have the woman spin more than the simple half turn, of course. The transition between the partner and neighbor swings feels deliciously orgiastic if you tell the men to end their partner swings facing their direction of progress (instead of across) while sending the women into center for their pull-by. The long lines at the beginning gives everyone just enough time to clear their heads a bit before the next go-round. Whee! |
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Monterey/MonteReine
Reel (November 1989) duple improper |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Swing the Next .
X X X X X X |
A2 |
Right hands In take
Hands across . Turn that Star ALL the way Round |
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B1 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . X X X X X X |
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B2 |
Long Lines Forward
and Back . X X X X X X |
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Nice simple
dance. I've started many an evening's program with it. Beginners need to
know that it's more important (and this is true of any kind of star) to
get their feet moving around in their foursome than to have their hands
in the correct configuration right away. With relatively experienced crowds,
I've done running starts with this dance after informing the dancers "The
star in this next dance is a hands across starwomen take right hands,
men take right handsand that's all you need to know." |
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Green Gyrene (December 1989) duple improper This dance celebrates the mother of all my favorite dancing skirts: a lime green, three-tiered, square dancing skirt (sans crinoline) inherited from my Mother. Lime green is not one of my more flattering colors, but I wore that skirt many times in my earlier dancing days because it twirled so fine. When that original skirt eventually gave out, I replaced it with a cotton (as opposed to carbon) copy in teal green, which is a great color on me. Turns out the design is a mathematical formula, where the circumference of each tier is a multiple of my waistline. So far, I've made two copies of the design with three tiers, one (an elegant white floor-length model) with four tiers, and two with two tiers. I get requests for how to make them very time I wear one. I get lots of requests for this dance, too. The lengthy neighbor swing of A2 makes this dance a great intro to out-of-minor-set choreography for a crowd with lots of newer dancers, since they have plenty of time to look around and find each other! |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
With the Next you
Allemande Right . X X Once and a Half |
A2 |
Back to the FIRST
Person and Swing . X X for a Long Time |
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B1 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . Three Quarters X X |
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B2 |
Women Chain . X X
X X |
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In teaching, I ask folks to tell their first neighbor, "I'll be back!" before having them reorient (Act's down, Inact's up) to find their future neighbor. With adequate space, popular opinion holds that a left-shoulder gypsy feels better, although a regular gypsy does better in a tight hall. The second time through, I might interject "Look fa-Miliar?" two beats into the gypsy. I tell the men to
"End that (partner) swing by sending the women into the center for a women's
chain," emphasizing the importance of getting the women to take hands
on the first beat of the next phrase and no later. This is one of my differentiation's
between what I call the "flying-trapeze" artists of contra dancing and
not-so-hotshot wannabes: any fancy spinouts from a swing into a chain
need to be timed to get the women into the center for their hands-taking
ON TIME! The women pull by on the second beat and touch the man on the
opposite side on the thirdthis gives folks most of the figure to
do what they will with the courtesy turn, be it lingering looks, spinning
tops, fancy pretzels, or whatever. |
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Rainbow @ Dawn (February 1997) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1997 This is one of the dances I've written for Bernie Scanlon, arguably one of the finest flying-trapeze artist/dancers in all of contradom. After raining all night, the Santa Cruz Dawn Dance of February '97 ended with a gorgeous rainbow as the sun rose through the breaking clouds. Bernie and I did the penultimate contra together, which had a Rory O'More figure with one's partner in long waves on the sides. I just love that figure! It's such a rush to spin twice and go directly into the balances as you catch hands. Afterwards, I didn't remember or bother to find out which dance it was, so I wrote this one. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
With the Next you
Allemande Right . X Once and a Little bit More |
A2 |
Wavy Lines you Balance
Right . X X Slide Right X X |
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B1 |
With yr Partner Allemande
Right . Special Person Allemande Left X X |
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B2 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . Three Quarters X X |
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The wavy lines in A2 are along the sides of the set, but the women will assume you want short waves across and won't let go of each other unless you warn them in advance. Tell them to let go of each other, walk past each other across the set, and make long waves with their partner in their right hand. The person in their left hand is their special person. Tight sets help to make the sequence of allemandes work fast enough to leave enough time for a decent partner swing, but I bet you saw that right away, right? Neighbor contact is minimal, so you might want to run this dance a little shorter than most. And yes - this is
one of those swing-circle-swing dances. |
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Monterey Hey (November
1989) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1989 |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Find the Next Neighbor
and Balance . X X Swing that Neighbor |
A2 |
Women Start a Hey
for Four . Women bythe Right Partner bythe Left |
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B1 |
Women Cross . Swing
yr Partner X X |
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B2 |
Face across do a
Rightleft Thru . X X X X |
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Nothing ambiguous,
so it makes good medley material. I've called it as part of a three part
medley of dances with heys in the middle of Hey Fever (Tony Parkes) and
Hale-Bopp a Re-Bop (see below). Nothing like a medley to inspire a sense
of accomplishment within a dance community. |
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Women's Club (October 1997) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1997 This dance is named for the darling hall at the corner of Third and Pine Streets in Chico, where the series has been since the second of its 14+ years. The original version of this dance (Chico Third and Pine) had the Rory O'More figure as A1, which made it awkward to get into the side-to-side motion from the pass thru at the end of B2. It doesn't have a neighbor swing, alas. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Pass Thru and Balance
Forward . X X Allemande Right Once aRound |
A2 |
Balance Right . X
X Slide Right X X |
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B1 |
With yr Partner Balance
and Swing . X X X X |
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B2 |
Left hands In fora
Left hand Star . X X All the way Round |
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What is
it about calling a Rory O'More figure that almost always gives me such wondrous
chills? |
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Hale-Bopp: A Re-Bop
(Spring 1997) Beckett © Reine Wonite 1997 |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Four in Line go Down
the Hall . X X X X |
A2 |
Bend yr Line and
Circle Left . Three Quarters X X |
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B1 |
Women Start a Hale
for Four . Women bythe Right Partner bythe Left |
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B2 |
Women Cross. Swing
yr Partners . X X X X |
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This is another Bernie-inspired dance. In this case, some dance we did together back in August of '96 called for a down the hall and back figure with one's partner. It took a few tries to work out the bugs, but we discovered we could keep one of us twirling at all times during the down and back, a seamless transition made possible via a California twirl (the shorter person goes under). Awesome! The trick is to have the outside person twirling *toward* the insider twirler. Also, it helps a *lot* if there's not too great a difference in heights between the partners. I've named it the "carwash" variation - my dream is to watch from the stage as both halves of a line of four does it in sync. Imagine a whole set! So, are you wondering
how it is I can call a Becket formation dance at the end of a medley with
two impropers? It's easy - IF the B1 of the improper ends with a partner
swing. When I'm about to change dances, I yell "Don't stop swinging! Don't
stop swinging!" at the end of B1, and continue doing so until it's time
to call the A1 of this dance. The four in line figure gives their ears
a chance to recover from all that swinging. |
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Humboldt Bay (October 1997) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1997 Every series needs its own dance, don't you think? The original version was writ for debut at an Arcata, CA, gig. |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
Find the Next to
Balance and Swing . X X X X |
A2 |
Face across Right
hands across . X X X X |
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B1 |
Women go Back foran
Allemande Right . Once around X X |
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B2 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . ALL the way Round X X X X |
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Humboldt Bay started out as a simple "balancing" variant of the Monterey Reel, with a balance and swing for A1 and a circle balance before the partner swing of B1. I wanted to create a teaching tool to cultivate a sense of timing among certain dancers (such as the auslanders of the north coast) that have danced together for years but somehow never learned this basic element of contra ecstasy. I led the Monterey dance for a half dozen changes, then stopped ("Now, that was not really the dance I wanted to call for you.") and did a quick rap on the advantages of actually timing one's movements to the musical phrasing. I then did a quick walkthru of the early version Humboldt dance, hoping the dancer's prior experience with the smooth version would help them coordinate their balances en masse. But in practice, I
wasn't impressed with the transition between the circle balance and the
partner swing of the earlier version, so I started tinkering. What resulted
is a different dance. |
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Turn A New Leaf (Spring 1997) duple improper © Reine Wonite 1997 I wanted to write a lost-n-found dance with a set of Petronella twirls that sends the partners into each other's arms. Too bad there's no neighbor swing in it. Once in a while, though... |
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About Reine's card notation | A1 |
New Neighbors Circle
Left . Three Quarters X X |
A2 |
Hands Four Balance
Four . X X Petronella Twirl |
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B1 |
Find yr Partner Balance
Now . X X Swing yr Partner |
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B2 |
Hands Four Circle
Left . X X X X |
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When the special people meet at the end of A1, the man offers his right hand and the woman offers her left hand, i.e., their inside hands. The Petronella circle/twirls of A2 happen with one's special person but *not* with one's partner. Towards the end of B2, the woman is next to her partner and needs to progress to find her next neighbors for the circle of A1. I've specified a ninety degree hand cast or gate figure, but I think it's nicer to have the men turn their partners under with an inside turn. For one thing, the women are less likely to get in each other's way, but in general, most guys welcome another chance to twirl their partners. |