Email to give my views on a birthday dance held at Clyst St Mary Hall, mid December 2016.
Unusually, this event went very well - it
had a sufficient number of good dancers and most of them stayed right to the end.
Many birthday and charity events are not as successful.
Hello Graham,
Many thanks for the dance evening - I thought it went very well.
I am often suspicious of charity or birthday events because so often they can be
dominated by people who cannot dance well. In the same hall a few years ago I was the only
competent dancer there at a charity dance - I took hold of one woman in a swing and she
screamed at the top of her voice - "Put me down - I've got two frozen
shoulders!" Attending a ceilidh was maybe not a good idea? But of course I got the
blame - as usual.
I said to Janet N on the way home that the dancing was maintained to the end and at a good
pace - so it was a proper dance evening. The floor was excellent and I had some wonderful
swinging around with Alison - her husband doesn't like swinging so she makes good use of
me. Do I mind?
I'd never done many of the dances before (or maybe I'd forgotten) so that is a benefit of
using a caller from another area. He did very well teaching the sheepskin hey. One of the
square set chorus figures was called by Jane at Willand recently and as part of
Carol Ormond dance - yet at your event it was used as part of a Ted Sannella dance. I
believe the origin is Colin Hume - it is a
chorus I use myself in a couple of dances!
You had a good turnout.
See you at Contra - etc.
Regards
Steve W.