I have been mixing contras into MWSD for about 25 years. The eight count
phrase is something to work on: I usually do it by telling the dancers that
the Dosado takes 8 steps, etc. There are even times I will start a piece of
music and have the dancers count the phrases -- clapping on beat one and
then on one and five.

My favorite dance to introduce contra with is "Inflation Reel" by Tony
Parkes. No figure repeats itself so there is more of the square dance feel
to it. It also avoids the overflow feeling of back-to-back courtesy turns.
    Inflation Reel
A1: Neighbor Dosado (or save some grief and use the square dance term
corner)
      Same one swing

A2: Down the hall in fours; turn as couples (or wheel turn)
      Come back; bend the line

B1: Right and Left Thru
      Ladies Chain

B2: Same four circle left once
      And one quarter and pass thru to new corner

All of the figures themselves are comfortable for MWSDers; with a little
coaching during the dance and using very strongly phrased music, the dancers
will smooth it out.

Praise the dancers at the end of this one for finding the phrase, and they
will carry that praise into anything else you do.

Remind them that the swing takes eight counts and that the band will not
play any faster so they might as well enjoy the swing without twirls.
Besides shorter swings for MWSDers, they are not hung up on having a partner
swing, or any swing at all in a dance.

*If anyone wants, I can give you a batch of dances that work very well with
square dancers.

*Paul Moore*
*North San Juan, CA*
*
On Thu, May 20, 2010 at 9:35 AM, Chip Prince <chipprince@mac.com> wrote:

> My take, having been at several IAGSDC conventions which featured a
> contra night, is that first and foremost you've got to get them to
> *feel the 8-count phrasing*. They simply haven't been conditioned to
> do that.
>
> Connected with that:
>
> 1. Show them not to rush the forward-and-back;
> 2. Show them not to rush the Ladies' chain;
> 3. Show them not to rush the right-and-left through...
> 4. ... and if you do it without hands, it's probably best to let them
> USE hands...
> 5. Of course, spend a little time on the art of the longer swing!
>
> Other goodies to know:
>
> 6. Do-si-do in MWSD so often goes a little farther and ends in a wave
> that you may have to remind them NOT to do that so that it can be
> followed by the left allemande or neighbor swing or whatever.
> 7. They may need to let go of the idea ending a move in a precise
> facing direction, since many contra sequences assume that dancers will
> then face the direction they need to for whatever comes next;
> 8. Up-and-down and progression are odd concepts after getting used to
> heads-and-sides and a square that doesn't go anywhere;
> 9. Probably the most unfamiliar thing to them will be the hey, but I'm
> sure they'll warm up to that as a novelty.
>
> The contra sessions I've experienced at IAGSDC conventions have been
> MOST successful when the callers were also MWSD people. The first one
> of these was in 2003 in San Diego, and Ron Nelson gave us a very good
> intro session that began in a Sicilian circle formation, beginning
> with the things the dancers already knew, and gradually introduced
> contra-specific ideas. He worked with Chris Ricciotti and Laura
> Johannes and used recordings from his and their extensive collections.
> I wanted to have at least one of them do the contra session the next
> year (2004 in Phoenix), but instead a local caller and band were
> hired. It was exciting, of course, to have the live band, but the
> caller was completely unprepared for the train wrecks that would
> result from a whole room full of people making the same mistakes in
> timing and execution while appearing initially to know all the moves.
> None of that would have happened if we had had Ron back, or Chris or
> Laura or Betsy Gotta or Andy Shore or Kris Jensen, who move
> comfortably between the two genres and are able to isolate the
> differences.
>
> Hope this is helpful!
>
> Chip
>
>
> On May 20, 2010, at 11:25 AM, Jack Mitchell wrote:
>
> > Some of the discussion recently seems to lead right into a question
> > (or
> > series of questions) that I'm going to need to answer for myself over
> > the next month or so: What's the best way to introduce contra to
> > current
> > MWSD folks. I was invited to call contras for a local MWSD group whose
> > caller is out of town at the national convention. As things have
> > turned
> > out, the group decided to combine with another local club for the
> > evening, so I'll be doing 90 minutes of contras and then the regular
> > caller will do the rest of the evening of squares. I'll be working
> > with
> > recorded music, but much of it will be recordings done at live dances,
> > which hopefully will give some of the feel. I'm also hoping to import
> > some of our regular contra dancers both
> >
> > So... Does anyone have thoughts on what I should/will need to
> > emphasize
> > in teaching to get MWSD folks doing contras? From what I've been
> > reading/watching, most of the moves that we have in common take
> > *about*
> > the same amount of time, but generally will be on the shorter side.
> > I'm
> > hoping that I'll be able to get them feeling not just the beat but the
> > phrase of the music so that we don't have the move wait call move wait
> > call that I see in so many MWSD videos.
> >
> > I also know that they're not going to be used to longer swings, so I'm
> > planning to talk about that, and the connection to partner and
> > neighbor,
> > and the opportunity for flourishes that longer swings (and slightly
> > more
> > time on the moves in general can allow).
> >
> > Then we get into allemandes, waves and such, all of which they're used
> > to doing hands down, rather than hands up elbows down like you
> > generally
> > do in a contra dance. When you get into things like balances, rory
> > o'mores and such, they're really going to need the weight that you can
> > get more easily with a hands up allemande/wave, but how likely am I to
> > be able to overcome training and muscle memory?
> >
> > Do folks have suggestions for any other problem moves (in that they
> > mean
> > one thing in MWSD and a completely -- or just enough to be troublesome
> > -- different thing in contra)? Any things that might work
> > particularly
> > well? Anyone done this already and have war stories (or better still,
> > success stories)?
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> > Jack Mitchell
> > Durham, NC
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
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