strathspey@strathspey.org:44934

Iain Boyd

Re: Angus Macleod- to promenade or not to promenade????????

March 31, 2006, 12:54 a.m. (Message 44934, in reply to message 44930)

As Simon has stated, the original diagrams produced by Hugh Foss show
dances using nearer hands.
   
  On the other hand, Ann Skipper's diagrams show dancers using nearer
  hands pushed forward which I suspect may be intended to indicate
  'leading'. I suggest that the MacLeod Dancers may have changed from
  'leading' to using 'promenade' hold after the advantages of
  'promenade' hold were realised.
   
  However, if one looks carefully at the last diagram in the
  'promenade' series in Ann Skipper's publication one will see a
  straight line joining one of the couples as well as the 'pushed
  forward' 'nearer hands - possibly suggesting 'promemade' hold (or
  just careless proofreading?)
   
  Iain Boyd
   
  

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx@xxx.xxx wrote:
  As far as I can recall over decades it's been promenade in Southern 
California. I've also just consulted a member of the "dem" team MacLeod Dancers, which 
does the dance, not surprisingly, quite often, and have had the same 
confirmed. As she said, and as my own mind recalls: nearer hands through (or making 
of course) the arch, then shift to promenade to dance around the standing 
corners and pass to the opposite sides. I think that the support of the promenade 
hold is really needed to make that turn around the standing corners, and 
nearer hands conjures in my mind a peculiar picture of the man dragging the woman 
around the corner "whip" style, much like the Red Queen dragging Alice and 
proclaiming: "It takes all the running you can do just to stay in the same 
place. If you want to get someplace else, you have to run twice as fast." In any 
case, hereabouts definitely promenade hold.

Robb Quint
Thousand Oaks, CA, USA


Send instant messages to your online friends http://au.messenger.yahoo.com