academie: 20YC Dance List

[Edvard Gayer]

I'll tackle a few of the recent topics:

1 - Bransle du Beaver:  Simple enough, consider that one deleted.  I thought 
folks would get a kick out of dancing a bransle suite to a non-period suite 
of tunes.  But there's two sides to the coin, and just because the dancers 
are being period does NOT mean that the musicians are immediately keen on 
being non-period.  They might object to being asked to play things like 
"Leave it to Beaver", "Gilligan's Island", or "The Brady Bunch".  Period is 
period, whether we're talking about the dance bit or the music bit, so this 
one gets nixed.  I have another game we can add if we find ourselves with 
surplus time.

2 - Tassel Kick:  Greg pointed out (privately) that this wasn't for 
"highest" kick, but most-stylized.  Simple 'nuff, 'eh?

3 - OOP dances.  I only received requests for two OOP dances, and one of 
them was clearly tongue-in-cheek.  The other is being danced at Coronation 
already, and I really don't want to open that can of worms again at 20YC.  
But I promise that I will talk to the musician coordinator and get a read 
from her before anything gets decided.  Right now, it's not on the list, 
because I believe it will be easier to add something controversial later 
than to have to defend it now.  :)

4 - IoC = 16th Century, not 14th.  That was a test.  Glad everybody did so 
well. ;)

So that everybody understands, the descriptions for the "dance diversions" I 
posted were distributed to the Academie only.  The only thing that's been 
published to the 20YC web is the list of dances.  For those who are on both 
lists, if we're going to have a discussion about them, this is the place to 
do it, not there.  :)

My idea behind the diversions is to emphasize that dancing is something you 
do for fun.  To some people (us, mostly) the dances themselves are 
sufficient cause for fun, but those who don't dance nearly as much may  view 
dancing quite differently.  We all know how to move through our different 
dances, so we can focus on embellishing our footwork, or trying to trip each 
other up, or see how many of us can simultanesously step on Judith's train.  
But others may sincerely be worried about looking goofy, or stepping on 
someone's toes, or may get so hung up about footwork and memorization that 
they have virtually no opportunity to enjoy the dance.

Our Princess, for example, loves to dance, but she only knows a very few 
dances, all of which are way out of period, and has had a difficult time 
finding opporutnity to dance in the SCA since moving from Meridies.  She has 
not learned any new dances, which I suspect is probably a combination of 
lack of time and fear of looking silly.  So, she is resigned to watching 
while others do what she wants to do.

By taking a couple of well-known and/or very easy dances and making games 
out of them, people will have a better chance of enjoying themselves, which 
is one of the things I'm trying to accomplish with the 20YC Ball.  I want to 
try my darndest to find something for everybody (yes, even those who only 
know "Hole"), while striving to keep things as period as possible (Playford 
debate notwithstanding).

If it's allright with y'all, I would like to table this discussion until 
after the weekend.  Coronation is upon us, with it's own unique obligations 
upon several of us.  The Academie will have plenty o' time afterwards to 
tell me what a lousy job I'm doing with 20YC.  :)

-V
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