strathspey@strathspey.org:29305

marjoriem

Re: Moving out of the way. Was: Strathspey Setting

Jan. 25, 2002, 11:43 p.m. (Message 29305, in reply to message 29273)

Thank you, Patricia and Nicholas for giving me another view of this practice
from ECD experience much more extensive than mine. I am not sure I was ever
"taught" to move in this manner, rather I picked up the habit from
observation and it was never corrected. But I will say that most of the time
I found it to be done with minimal fuss and certainly not as a distraction
from the dancing couple. The practice appeared to be a "freer" and less
rigid way of accommodating the movement of couples around one another.

This seems analogous to the method of stepping up or down in ECD which is
commonly done with the couple taking hands and moving together, or when
couples stay closer to the center of the set after a back to back and before
beginning changes of a circular hey. I may be running afoul of approved
practice but I confess that the freer movement appealed to me after many
years of "this is the only way thus-and-such can be done" classes in SCD.

I'm not advocating uncontrolled abandon as I enjoy the well-executed dance
and figure, but my overriding motivation is always the joy of the music and
the joy of the social interaction and if that means freer movement, I plead
guilty.

Marjorie McLaughlin
San Diego, CA

> If it is absolutely necessary to move, then we make the minimum, most
> discreet movement.  One situation that seems to require some movement from
> the supporting dancers is when the two men, starting from their own side,
> cross through the two women and cast back to each other's place, and then
> the two women do as much.  There usually isn't room for the casting
dancers
> to fit between the standing dancers of adjacent minor sets.  See "Juice of
> Barley" for an example of this.  As supporting dancers we take a small
step