Stories behind dance titles [JBMilne]

Richard Goss

Message 30244 · 3 Apr 2002 09:52:48 · Fixed-width font · Whole thread

J.B. Milne

[Sorry if this posting has already been added to further on, but I have been out of town and 20 pages of e-mails need to be cleared & too lazy to do this off line for short responses.]

I spoke to Foss [devisor] and later to Fitchet [composer] and can verify the story from my own notes taken at the time. However, my notes add a little more to the story.
Angus Fitchett's motivation for the title was not only was that the cinima owner his friend, but J B Milne also played the cello in a band with him.[

This was one of the very first topics discussed on the Strathspey list
when it was new in late 1993. The story goes that the J.B. Milne in
question (nobody was able to say what the initials stand for) was the
owner of a cinema (or chain of cinemas). In the first half of the dance,
the movements of the dancers depict the way of the film through the
reels of the projector, and in the second half the rectangular pattern
of the corners represents the screen while the first couple represents
the actual film. The book doesn't say so this is all apocryphal but if
it isn't actually true then it is at least nicely invented. It's a Hugh
Foss dance; IMHO Hugh Foss was probably the most original dance deviser
so far in the history of SCD.

> Culla Bay

This is somewhere in the Outer Hebrides, presumably Benbecula. Ann Dix
of London devised this dance fairly recently for a friend who used to
live there (or some such).

> Postie's Jig

I've heard it say that the arches action in the middle part of the dance
symbolizes the tying up of a parcel but I wouldn't know how reliable
this is. The dance was devised by Roy Clowes, and it seems to have
entered the international folk dance (non-SCD) circuit; I've done
Postie's Jig (or various specimens of dances that resemble it more or
less closely) with all sorts of people in all sorts of places.

> Diamond Jubilee

There are several dances of this name but the most well-known of them
(the 32-bar jig) was devised by Bob Campbell and appears in the RSCDS'
diamond jubilee book (book 31). It is probably safe to say that it was
written to celebrate that occasion.

Anselm
--
Anselm Lingnau .......................................... xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxx.xxx
I'm not into working out. My philosophy: No pain, no pain. -- Carol Leifer

R Goss
[xxxxxxx.x.xxxx@xxx.xxx]