[SCA-Dance] looking for a few good dances to start our group

tmcd at panix.com tmcd at panix.com
Wed May 14 01:02:50 EDT 2008


On Sun, 11 May 2008, Alex Clark <alexbclark at pennswoods.net> wrote:
> At 04:09 PM 5/8/2008 -0500, Tim McDaniel wrote:
> > > & are there any others that are simple for beginners?
> >
> >I've always been fond of Half Hannigan for a warmup.
> >- it's vigorous without being exhausting (if your music isn't too
> >    long)
> >- it's the prototypical English Country Dance, consisting of nothing
> >    BUT doubling, siding, and arming
>
> On the contrary, this does not make it a prototype. It is more like
> an eviscerated ECD.

There's no more evidence that it was designed by cutting down a dance
than there is that it was built minimally.  It does practice the basic
steps (other than set and turn single).

> >- it's a mixer, so it's good for "how do you do?" or a brief "hi,
> >    Jane, long time no see!"
>
> I advise against teaching this modern dance to beginners.

I see that the Terpsichore booklet is misleading when it states the
usual SCA version is "Playford 1651" when the source at
<http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~flip/contrib/dance/playford.html#Playford_43>
or <http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/playford_1651/050small.html>
shows it as Longways for as many as will.

I'm not at all good at interpreting Playford: is there a good
reconstruction that my brief Googling didn't show?
<http://members.ozemail.com.au/~grayn1/DDances.html#Halfe Hanikin>
looks basically plausible to me: you have to get #1 man and #N woman
"offside" and then get them back in dancing with the same sex as
Playford specifies.  But it doesn't state exactly how #1 man and #N
woman get offside and the rest progress, and then get back in, and the
ways coming to my mind right now feel awkward to me.

Just to make sure: does the music in the facimile match the music as
I believe it's usually played in the SCA?

Dannet Lincoln
-- 
Tim McDaniel; Reply-To: tmcd at panix.com


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