Jude's Journal Issue 2009-1

Jude’s Journal 

by Jude Conroy

WHERE ARE THEY?

Bon Voyage to our Toni Charbonneau. She’s part of a sailing crew moving a boat from Panama to Florida! Fair winds to ya Toni!

Donnalyn just came back from Mallorca, Spain where she was visiting her son and his family. I am anxious to hear all about your adventure Donnalyn .

Correction: Bill Ossa. He’s in Africa, not China. Good thing, we don’t want him getting into anything made with melamine! He’s teaching at the Morogora Teacher College. Go Bill! Teach the folks how to contra, spread the word and dance steps!

Ellen ~ we miss you gal! Ellen is looking after her dad up in c o l d Wisconsin. The day I received her e-mail it was MINUS 20! Burrrrrrrrrrr! 

APPLAUSE & HURRAH

Kudos to the wonderful music Simon Kiefer has been booking on our dancing behalf! Music and callers have been outstanding. Lots of good dances being called on our S.B. wonderful sprung floor! How lucky we are!

More kudos to our regular dancers, who in the course of an evening help out our newcomers (potential continuous community dancers). Steering a newcomer in the correct direction with your hand movement, eye direction and body language is very helpful. 

I remember being a newcomer. Wow, it was confusing for a long time and I really appreciated those of you who took a little time out to help my direction along the way. Sometimes I still need direction! HA! (No comments from the peanut gallery thank you very much.)

Our New Year's Dance in Ojai was just wonderful. Kudos to Karin Dron for all the work you do to make our Ojai dance possible. Our dancing friends from L.A., S.B., and Riverside helped fill the hall with smiles, laughter, warmth, fun, twirls and synchronized stomping. What a wonderful way to bring in the New Year! YES!

Dance Floor Courtesy: Please, no perfume, heavy scented lotions or aftershaves. 

Many thanks to the persons who change their shirts/blouses during the course of an exuberant evening of fun dancing .

DANCING PROTOCOL

One of the most noticeable and attractive points of contra dancing is eye contact. Some of us have a problem with eye contact but eyebrow, nose or forehead eye contact is ok too! Just check out how eye contact on the popular TV program “Dancing With the Stars” looks. Could you ever imagine them not looking at each other!  

Eye, eyebrow or nose eye contact also keeps one from getting dizzy!

CONTRA CORNERS: When I first had to do this complex move, oh my gosh! Confusing, you betchya. Little hint: if you were to put your arms out into a ‘V” shape, you would be heading to the person across from your right arm, go around this person and meet your partner in the middle, half turn with your partner then off to the person you pointed to with your left arm, then back to your partner. Congratulate yourself and dance on with a smile .

PASS THROUGH: Ok, which shoulder of the person across from you do you pass? Right or left? Explore this with your fellow dancers ~ Gary or Donnalyn will teach or answer this question on the dance floor.

CONTRA CARNIVALE was held in San Luis Obispo (SLO) January 16-18. What a wonderful weekend of music, dancing, making new and reacquainting with friends from all parts of the USA. The weather was delightful, hall was beautiful and our hosts did a fabulous job of hosting. Kudos SLO chapter . One of the best parts of a dance weekend is getting to know people better. I haven’t been disappointed yet!

Some up and coming dances are Fiddling Frog in Pasadena, Monte Toyon near Santa Cruz, Balance the Bay, May Madness in Prescott, AZ, Labor Day Dance Away in Julian, Dance in the Desert outside Tucson (November).

Want to know about many local and away dances? Contact louise-danceinfo [at] earthlink [dot] net. Tell Louise you would like to be added to the mailing roster. Tell Louise you are a part of the SBCDS (Santa Barbara Country Dance Society) community.

Another source of info is on a corner of the SBCDS website: http://www.sbcds.org/festivals/

Want to become part of the SBCDS Group on line community goings on notices? E-mail Gary Shapiro at:

garys [at] sbcds [dot] org

 Contra Community Artistic Members Showings:

Mary Thompson’s Sculptures in Faulkner Gallery at

the SB Library, 40 W. Anapamu St, SB ~ now, 

until 2/28

Let Jude know your comings/goings/celebrations. This column is for this dance community. Respond to cloud-merlin [at] roadrunner [dot] com.

SBCDS Calendar in your Calendar or PIM program

You can embed the SBCDS calendar into your own Personal Information Manager (PIM) or calendar program if it supports the iCalendar format. Copy and use this address to subscribe (right-click, Mac ctrl-click).

Here is a list of applications with iCalendar support.

Ventura ECD Experiment Quite the Success

Way back in January 2007, we began an English Country Dance series in Ventura on the First Monday of each month.

It drew many curiosity-seekers, and a respectable crowd when we had live music and a caller from England, Colin Hume. Other than that, most of our ECD fans in Ventura County found it difficult to attend, and most dances lost a small amount of money.

One of our biggest Ventura fans, Susan Pineda, located another site for us that we could use on Sunday afternoon, and has a padded floor. So on September 16, we tried a Third Sunday afternoon dance.

We had great attendance, and not just curiosity-seekers. As the dance ended, I asked if people felt we should start up a Sunday series in January. This was unacceptable! All wanted to just keep going, which meant starting in earnest on the next Third Sunday, October 21. That dance, too, was well attended. Enough to rent the hall, pay the caller, and some left over for the sponsoring group (three homeschool groups).

The November dance would have been the same date as our Pre-Thanksgiving Event, which included an English Country Dance in the afternoon, so the November Ventura dance was canceled.

The December dance came around, but the three of us driving down there started encountering serious smoke in Ventura County. This was the day of the big fires in Southern California. That dance was canceled, both because the air was unhealthy and most folks were wise enough to stay home.

In January, the SBCDS began sponsoring the dance, which moved to First Sundays, to avoid the kind of problem we enountered in November. (There can never be an afternoon dance on First Sundays at the Ballroom because the Tea Dance is in the Ballroom on First Sunday afternoons.)

Both the January and February dances (the latter featuring guest caller Ben Rotenberg) were successful, such that the rent could be paid, the caller paid, and some left over toward SBCDS expenses.

Maybe we'll see you there on one or more first Sundays!

Volunteer Honor Roll

Thank you past and present volunteers! Here is a list of at-the-dance volunteers from the past (some of whom are present volunteers as well).

Did we miss you? Spell your name wrong? Do you want to be removed from this list? If so, please contact us.

Dance coordination

Joe Aleks, Rob Gardner, Tom Biesanz, Barry White, Roxan MacDougall, Marty Frith, John Redding, Matthew Thornley, Rebecca Zendejas, Don Higgins, Jeff Kidson, Duncan Badine, Bob Mesick, Keith Connes, Ann Paff, Peter Glatz, Ramsey Harris, Jane Leavitt, Rodrigo Soria, Chris Ritter, Laura Ritter, David Lee, Dick Anderson

Greeters

Moira Butler, Marilyn Whitford, William Noack, Jean Olson, Annelie Zeise, Susan McNeil, Heather Babaoye, Christine Loizeaux, Laura Waters, Ann Kidson, Linda Bernson, Leslie Tejada, Lois Holt, Vicki Gardner, Hazel Frosher, Leah Diamond, Jo Wamser, Sammy Ellis, Luci Andrino, Jonnie Lawhon, Tina Fear, Jean Olson, Alice Williams, Anita Hendricks, Jane Leavitt, Patricia Jessup, Jatila Davis, Carol Wade, Justine Sutton, Doris Gordon, Jeanette Love, Simin Rastan, Joann Eisberg, Elaine Miller, Jennifer Tom, Jim Moresi, Carolyn Coleman, Doris Gordon

Refreshments

Steve Spiers, Monica Spiers, Charlotte Gould, Mark Edwards, Tony Marzio

Scheduling

Kelli Butler, Vicki Gardner, Simon Kiefer

Letter of appreciation from Scott Swain

Scott Swain submitted this appreciative letter for the Dance Star that would have come out this month:

Dear Fellow Dancers,

Thank you for honoring me at the dance last September 9. It was a great dance and I appreciate the high attendance on that wonderful evening.

I can't believe how quickly the years have passed since I first started contra dancing, and volunteering shortly afterwards. Helping to keep the dances running has been a satisfying endeavor.

I would like to thank many other "behind the scenes" volunteers who have pitched in to help over the years. Without their help, it would not have been possible for any one person to have kept the dances going. They all deserve our thanks. We all owe a special thanks to Joe Aleks, who has been setting up the contra dances for at least as long as I have been, and has often offered to help even when it was not convenient for him to do so. Our volunteers who have recently pitched in to set up the dances include Rob Gardner, Tom Biesanz, Roxan MacDougall, Barry White, and Marty Frith. A list of previous volunteers can be found here on this weblog.

Finally, a big thank you to Marty Frith for kindly assenting to take over my duties as the Event/Dance Coordinator, and to Moira Butler, who took over the duties of coordinating the front door Greeters a few years ago.

Here's to many more years of dancing for everyone.

Revels: Santa Barbara's New Seasonal Tradition

Santa Barbara Revels launches an exciting holiday tradition this year with "The Christmas Revels: in Celebration of the Winter Solstice." Santa Barbara Revels is the newest of ten Revels companies nation-wide, the first having started in Cambridge, MA, 37 years ago, and each presents fully staged and costumed productions that incorporate traditional music, dance, drama and ritual and commemorate the changing seasons.

This inaugural production of Santa Barbara Revels focuses on the traditions of Medieval and Renaissance England, with vocal performances from SBCC’s Quire of Voyces, conducted by music director Nathan Kreitzer, and from the Revels Children's Chorus, led by Pam McLendon. The newly-formed Revels Morris Men will present a variety of traditional dances, the James Michael Consort will perform musical selections on 15th and 16th Century instruments, and the Revels Brass Ensemble, composed of musicians from the Santa Barbara Symphony, will provide musical accompaniment.

All Revels companies incorporate volunteer and professional performers and are inter-generational, multi-ethnic and non-denominational. All productions contain the hallmark Revels characteristics of audience participation and community celebration.

Susan Keller is Founder/Producer of Santa Barbara Revels and Maggie Mixsell the Stage Director for performances on Thursday, December 6, from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. (as part of First Thursday) and Sunday, December 9, at 12:30 p.m. Both performances are in the Courtyard of the historic Casa de la Guerra, 15 E. De la Guerra Street. Thursday is a preview performance open to the public; tickets for Sunday’s performance can be purchased at the door, $10 for adults and $5 for children over three. For additional information: www.santabarbararevels.org or call 565-9357.

No Winter Dance Star?

The Dance Star is on hiatus due to lack of a staff.

Contact any of the SBCDS Board members (http://www.sbcds.org/contacts/) for more information on helping with the editorial and/or production aspects of our quarterly newsletter.

In the meantime, this Dance Star Online is alive and well if anyone has any suitable contributions for it.

Also in the meantime, a flyer-schedule combo is being printed in lieu of the Dance Star and is available for download.

Debuting Band #3: Dannsair

Flutist Suzanne Duffy writes in and tells us she is…

bring[ing] in another band to the contradance community, the Santa Barbara-based Celtic band, Dannsair, led by guitarist Russell Doherty. Dannsair has had longstanding performance engagements at two much-loved Irish pubs in Santa Barbara, Sunday evenings at the James Joyce and Thursday evenings at Dargan's. And for some time, contradancers have stopped by for a listen and encouraged the band to consider performing for a contradance. So here we go! We're delighted and honored to be partnered with caller Susan Petrick from the Bay area for our debut dance. Hope you'll come close out your Thanksgiving holiday weekend with us on Sunday, November 25th.

We'd also like to apologize for misspelling the band's name in the Dance Star. If you download it now, though, it's been corrected.

Debuting Band #2: Aolian

[Waiting for any of our intrepid reporters to land some info.]

Debuting Band #1: Atlantic Crossing

From their website:

This band was started in 1987 to share traditional music from both sides of the Atlantic and points beyond. Over the years, we have played traditional American music from the Appalachians and Louisiana, the Balkans and Middle East, and now, we are playing primarily contra dance music.

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