Resources

At least for now this will only list British resources - others welcome, I just don't know any. Please send me more material.

Advice and 'How-To'
Dance collections and books
Tune book collections for dancing
Where to get books and CDs
Societies
Insurance
Links to other pages

Advice and 'How-To'

How to run a ceilidh - online booklet by Derek Kingscote
How To Put On A Fund-raising Gig - booklet available from Simon Cox of Jellied-Reels DOT co DOT uk: sdc123
AT hotmail DOT com
A Caller's Check List - " a list of questions to ask when someone asks you to call a ceilidh for them" by Hugh Stewart. Read this!

Dance Collections and Books

Although there are lots of booklets with collections of dances, many of them are aimed at dance clubs rather than barn dances (i.e. the dances they contain are intended for experienced regular dancers rather than occasional dancers). The following ones are all usable for barn dances.

Community Dances Manual, originally pub. by EFDSS, Books 1-7 repub. 1986 as a single volume by Princeton Book Company, Princeton, NJ. ISBN 916622-45-2. This is the old warhorse, but a bit dated now.

The Barn Dance Book. by John Reay, pub. by Barn Dance Publications, Surrey, 1990, 2nd ed 1992. ISBN 0-951-4285-5-1. Good set of varied dances, occasionally idiosyncratic. Tunes too, but only one tune per dance.

Callers' Choice, vols 1 and 2. Pub. by EFDSS (see above).Vol 1 (1973) edited by N and J Matthews, ISBN 0 85418 035 4. Vol 2 (1981) edited by J Hamilton, 0 85418 137 7. Nearly 20 useful dances in each volume, with some tunes.

The Barn Dance series (Barn Dance Party, Barn Dance Fiesta, Barn Dance Shindig, ...) by the Ring O'Bells Band is advertised by Hobgoblin. Almost certainly available from everyone else too. I've used their first two books, now out of print, and they contained a varied set of dances with tunes (two or three per dance). Accompanying CDs available, see below.
 

Night of the Fight, by Martyn Harvey. Obtainable from the author at 2 Airlie Villas, Gillingate, Kendal, Cumbria LA9 4JD, UK. Has 19 simple new dances.

So - You want to be a Caller, by Charles Bolton. Published by Cotswold Music Society. Small booklet of useful advice.

Calling for Contra Dances: A Basic Text, by Tony Parkes. Published by Hands Four Books, Box 641, Bedford, Massachusetts 01739, USA, in 1992. A substantial and well-considered volume. Although aimed at American readers and New England-style dances, much of the advice on calling applies to English barn dances. Covers Getting Started, Delivering the Calls, Choosing your Material, Working with Music (i.e. tape/band/etc.), Sound Equipment, Calling for Special groups, etc. An excellent read. Highly recommended.

Elements of English Country Dance, edited by Hugh Stewart. Published by The Round (Cambridge University English Country Dancing Club). Obtainable from the editor at 14 Silverwood Close, Cambridge CB1 3HA, UK, and possibly from EFDSS, Derek Appleing, etc. This does not contain any dances but it describes the background, the styles, the moves, etc. in a readable and very informative way. Inexpensive. Recommended. New edition now out (this page has browsable definitions of dance moves).

The Oak Tree, edited by Paul Hudson. Published by Dave Mallinson Publications, 1999. Contains 36 dances graded easy/moderate/advanced with appropriate tunes (2 per dance), plus a glossary of dance terms and two sample programmes for an evening's dancing, one for less experienced and one for more experienced dancers. An interesting and varied selection.

The Willow Tree, by Hugh Rippon and Dave Mallinson. Published by Dave Mallinson Publications, 1996. Contains 26 dances, some traditional and some by Hugh Rippon, with appropriate tunes (2 per dance) beautifully presented. All suitable for barn dances.

New Barn-Dances from Hampshire, compiled and published by Rob Haskell (with the assistance of Hampshire County Council, good for them). Contains 28 new dances, mostly quite easy, written by Rob and his friends. £3.50. Order direct from Rob at rob_haskell@uk.ibm.com.

Twentieth Century Dances (Dawnsiau yr Ugeinfed Ganrif) edited by John Mosedale and Eddie Jones. £7.50 from the Welsh Folk Dance Society 37 new dances, some easy some harder, some interesting new ideas to try. Includes preferred tunes for some dances, very clear and readable score. Bi-lingual Welsh-English (except that the titles of dances and tunes are Welsh-only, which is fine, but a guide to pronunciation might have been a good idea!) Published with assistance from the Welsh Books Council, good for them. (From the same source: other publications, including "Something Old, Something New", new dances written by Pat Shaw and old dances interpreted by him, some not previously published, an excellent edition.)

Encyclopaedia Blowzabellica, compiled by members of the Blowzabella band. Published by Dragonfly Music,44 Durban Street, Bkyth, Northumberland NE24 1PT. Contains lots of excellent tunes and a fair number of dances, some English and some Breton, French, Belgian, etc.

Tune book collections for dancing

Getting hold of music should be the band's job - they know what they like. But if you want a specific tune you may have to help.

Personally, I think we should all should buy lots of tune books, because their creators and pubishers need support, and they're incredible value for money - they last for years and go on being useful - even if you don't play yourself you can use them to suggest tunes when the players run out. And having lots of books in print means that different versions get around - if everyone played the same tunes in the same versions with the same harmonies life would get boring.

If you're just going to get one book, I recommend either Play In The Band or Band Swing:

Play In The Band, edited by Barry Moule. Published by the Cotswold Music Society. 1995. ISBN 1 870635 19 1. Lots of tunes, which (this is the really useful bit) are already organised into sets for dancing. Also has those extra things you sometimes need, like Happy Birthday. You can just pick it up and go.

Band Swing, edited by Pete Mac. Published by Dave Mallinson. 1998, ISBN 1-899512-56-X. Lots of tunes arranged into sets. Has a useful idea: easy versions of some of the hard tunes, e.g. 'Son of Levi' is an easy version that can be played alongside or intead of that tricky little number, Levi Jackson Rag.

If you're searching for a specific tune there are some useful web sites:

Eric Foxley's Music Data Base has tunes in music notation, stored as gif files. A huge number of tunes of all kinds. Slow to load.

The world wide abc index will lead you to tunes in 'abc' format (this is an ascii format, very compact, which can be transcribed by hand or by program - see About abc format). Again a huge number of tunes of all sorts.

The Round Band's tune list is also useful. Sets of tunes for traditional dancing, in gifs. Only two 48-bar jigs at the time of writing this; you'll usually want more than that.

Richard's Tunebook is maintained by Richard Robinson of Leeds, England; many types of tune available as compact gifs. Has a well-organised search system.

CDs of barn dance music:

Ideally you have a band of enthusiastic, skilful musicians, familiar with the repertoire and with no other commitments, just dying to play for you. If only.

Back in the real world, I've had several queries from people with no access to musicians at all, but who want to put on a dance. So it has to be a tape or a CD. CDs are much easier to use.

Hobgoblin list several book/CD combinations in the Barn Dance series by the Ring O'Bells band. I have not used any of the CDs, but the two books that I've used are quite good.

Where to get those books, CDs, music, etc:

Societies

Consider joining these two societies: EFDSS because everyone does, CDSS because it has a very good range of news, booklets, etc. plus a useful and interesting newsletter.

There is also (especially for Welsh people - but certainly not only for them) the Welsh equivalent, supplying publications (dance books, tapes, videos), event news, etc on a colourful and interesting site:

 

Insurance

Suppose someone twists their ankle at a dance, or slips and breaks their arm. They then decide to sue for loss of earnings. I've not known this happen, but it could, and I can invent scenarios where the caller might easily be judged liable for not exercising due care. For example, one of the sets got very boisterous and the caller didn't check them; or there was a problem with the floor and a woman got her heel stuck and twisted her ankle. (That happened to my wife.) In that second case it might be held that the caller should have inspected the floor and at least have warned the dancers.

So you may wish to be insured.

EFDSS members are insured for folk activities - that seems to include calling, but it's not explicit.

Additional note from Hugh Stewart:

There was an opaque note in the circular sent out [by EFDSS] with the Summer magazine that ended "This extension of cover should obviate the need for callers and musicians to have separate Public Liability insurance (unless full time professionals)."

On the other hand I presume "Public Liability" doesn't mean they cover you against having your musical instrument stolen.

Explicit insurance against public liability while calling is available from:

(NEW ADDRESS)

Musicians Insurance Services
312 High St
Harlington
Hayes
Middlesex UB3 5BT

tel. 0845-345-7529; fax 020 8564 0963
www.musiciansinsurance.co.uk

The cost is not too high: for 2002 I paid £45.

Links

There are lots of dance pages on the web. The ones below are particularly relevant to barn dancing.

webfeet lists bands, events, agencies, shops, organisers ... for many types of dance, including English ceilidhs. A very well organised site.

Colin Hume's site includes much useful material (find the button labelled 'dance').

Scottish ceilidh dances are extremely well described on Ian Brockbank's page. At Scottish ceilidhs they do a lot of partner dances done in a circle (like the Gay Gordons. Britannia Two-Step, etc), rather than the 4- and 5-couple set dances that are so common in England. (This page includes a long series of messages about the many different ways that different people dance the Gay Gordons ... and I thought I knew how to do it!)

Contra dance notation from the Cambridge Contra Dance Club page - mostly too hard for barn dances.

On-line definitions of folk dance moves and steps, from Hugh Stewart's Elements (see above).

Eric Foxley's page on playing for dances is worth reading even for callers.

The Spike Island Dance Band's home page leads to a list of useful tunes for barn dances, downloadable in various formats, including MIDI (useful for practising calling). (It also has an excellent introductory page about what a barn dance is, what their caller will do, and emphasizing their reliability etc. - a reminder to us all.)

Bob Archer's home page has useful links and some dances by him.

Contradancers of Hawaii run a great pages, lots of dances, some tunes, excellent links to other dance stuff.

Palmer's Pocket Playford is maintained by The Round at Cambridge (in Cambridgeshire) and gives notation for lots of Playford Dances

Western Square Dance and related dance forms (a tradition that is closely related to the barn dance, yet astonishingly different in its culture)

International folk dances are listed and described by Bob Shapiro and also by the California folk dance federation

If you're in the Leeds / Bradford area, come to Contra Dance Leeds

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Last updated 17 December, 2004