[SCA-Dance] "Drive the Cold Winter Away"

[Tim McDaniel]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2015, White,John <john.white at drexel.edu> wrote:
> So, it's not "Drive the Cold Winter Away"?

http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/playford_1651/046small.html
http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~white/ECD/drivewinter.html
http://round.soc.srcf.net/dances/cdb/cdb6/drive

Oooer!  A Christmas carol that dates to 1625 (hey, only 24 years out
of period!), though I don't know whether the Playford tune is the same
as at
http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Hymns_and_Carols/drive_the_cold_winter_away.htm
)!

The leading around might look very nice when we dance the candle dance
at Candlemas: the dancers hold candles and have the only light in the
hall, so whirling geometrics work well.

It's USA, so the verses are no prob (and not setty-turny, bonus).
The choruses are (1) men do it, (2) women do it, (3) same as 1.

Except I can't figure out one bit, the instructions for the first man
/ woman.

"First man backe a D. then goe downe between the rest and turne the
last Wo but one then the last, and stay there while the other men go
between the 2. and the third We. and goe toward the left hand and fall
downe to the first man _._"

- They can't all be facing the head of the hall as after "Leade up all
a D. forwards and back", because they do it after siding and arming
too when they're facing their partners.

- If man 1 is facing his partner and backs a double from her, I don't
see how he could then go down the middle (I interpret "btween the
rest" as being between the line of men and the line of women), because
it doesn't say that he goes forward again and especially because the
entire line of men are, I think, filing along in the way.  Unless they
don't move until he's all the way at the bottom, which is kind of
implied by the wording, but we'd want to speed that up for a
performance.

- So a zero-time turn left to face the head of the hall + left 30
degrees, back a double between the two lines (couple 2 warning/shoving
him if he got the angle wrong), then the men start moving while the
first man completes the turn to walk down to woman N-1?

Anything seems awkward if not impossible.  What am I missing?
Any live-fire notes?

Danyell de Lyncoln
-- 
Tim McDaniel, tmcd at panix.com