I have kept my silence so far, but our unamed GUEST has made my blood boil totally.

Les from Hull, if it isn't elitist, then why only male dancers?

Anne if you are involved with a regular team you will surely know the hours of practice that are put in by every side, mostly trying to perfect what they do. Many teams do go out & regularly dance to one man & a dog & it makes little difference to them as they do enjoy what they are doing & do so as much for their own pleasure as for a display. However I know how embarassed many teams are by scratch sides who insist on dancing in very public arenas, no matter how good the individual dancers are, they are still shambolic because they never practice together.

As FolkieDave has pointed out Morris & for that matter most folk music & dancing is ridiculed by the general public & the media, & many people have been striving for years to pull it out of the mire & into a respected form of entertainment.

While I do feel that people should enjoy the paticipation of all types of folk music & dance, I feel that if we as a genre are presenting ourselves to the world, then we shouldn't on very public occasions present ourselves as a load of bunglers. I am sick of people taking Morris as a joke. In England we have no other form of National dance & Morris is the nearest we come to it, so if you want to go out in a scratch side, then at least make the effort to make sure that you have some kind of uniformity in both what you wear & the performance that you give.

Angela