strathspey@strathspey.org:44835

Anselm Lingnau

Re: Two Chords

March 22, 2006, 4:53 p.m. (Message 44835, in reply to message 44834)

Martin Sheffield wrote:

> Was there not a move to get rid of the two chords a short while ago?
> Which of the defenders of the chords managed to prevail, I wonder, so that,
> once again, we got "no change" ?
>
> As mentioned, the Manual is the only thing that is allowed to change, it
> seems.

Don't forget that the RSCDS is, at the end of the day, a standards body. 
Standards bodies are conservative by nature. Conservatism in a standards body 
is commonly considered a Good Thing, as one does not want do chase after 
every new-fangled idea that might come up. Things should settle down for a 
bit before they show up on a standards body's radar screen.

Anyway, the SCD scene no longer works like it did in the early 1930s. The 
Society no longer has any real power to control how SCD is actually being 
done all over the world; there is too much dancing going on in places that 
the Society doesn't really reach. It may try to gradually influence things 
(especially through the teacher training process) but imposing drastic 
changes (such as the poussette-on-the-right-foot-for-men idea) isn't 
possible; anything of the sort would merely create lots of confusion and 
argument, and (if the changes are too severe or too ridiculous) would 
probably be ignored by large parts of the community. Such an event would 
basically mean the end of the Society as an important player in SCD (and 
would likely be detrimental for SCD in the long run), and therefore this is 
about as likely to happen as an assembly of turkeys voting in favour of the 
practice of holding Thanksgiving dinners.

Having said that, especially in an area like the two-chords debate, which 
touches only on a minute part of the RSCDS repertoire, it is unproductive to 
look to the RSCDS to mandate something which is contrary to current practice 
(and playing two chords for the type of dance in question *is* current 
practice, no doubt about that), in particular if current practice isn't 
really an RSCDS idea to begin with. (Tinkering with the strathspey poussette, 
for example, is fine for the RSCDS since they invented it in the first place; 
note the ongoing controversy on exactly when hands should be dropped on set & 
link to see just how big the RSCDS influence is concerning issues that do not 
matter one way or another to a large majority of dancers -- however strongly 
people like the originator of the concept may feel.)

For the just-one-chord proponents, it seems a more promising approach to 
educate the people out in the field directly -- dance dev^H^H^Hauthors, event 
organisers/MCs, and musicians. Apparently John Drewry, one of the main 
originators of »two-chord dances« has already seen the light, so if we give 
the idea another decade or two things may have settled the way Simon et al. 
would like, and then the RSCDS will be happy to follow suit in their 
publications. If not, then it's not as if the world would come to a sudden 
end, either.

Anselm
-- 
Anselm Lingnau, Frankfurt, Germany ..................... xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxx.xxx
Rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk
for people who can't read.                                      -- Frank Zappa