Best 3 couple dances

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 22 Jun 12 - 10:56 AM

Wiltshire six hand reel is a good old favourite, great tune as well.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 22 Jun 12 - 08:57 AM

Sounds like you are getting to know your group.

I called a dance on Monday where the pattern was perfectly clear in my head but I totally failed to get it into the dancers heads. Ahhh well.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Genie
Date: 22 Jun 12 - 02:31 AM

One of the loveliest, liveliest, and most fun couple dances in the world, I think, is the Swedish dance the Hambo! As with other dances like the waltz or tango or East Coast swing or fox trot, the Hambo can be done to a wide array of tunes. But I do strongly recommend learning some Hambo tunes if you're in a band that plays dance tunes.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: GUEST,FloraG
Date: 21 Jun 12 - 02:18 PM

Thanks for all the advice. More turned up today, but I now have a few more 3 couple dances in my head. I called teds triplets. Its about as complicated as the group can cope with.
Thanks again
Flora.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 14 Jun 12 - 05:30 PM

Whitby Seaweed Dance is 3 couple. It's already on Mudcat somewhere but here are the basics.

Longways
Tunes 48bar jigs but we used to play Oyster Girl & New Rigged Ship 2A+1B

The Crab-All couples join 2 hands across and scuttle down set for 8 and then back. (In reality a steady gallop)

Starfish--6-hand right hand star and then left (With other hand all wave to whoever else is in the room)

Lobster Pot (bit like an upside down 6 person basket) All arms round adjacent dancers' shoulders, lean in and skip/slip round to the left.

Weave the nets, twice. (Dip and dive starting with top couple under)

Top couple swing down and finish at bottom of set.

Warning...all action...no standing around.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 14 Jun 12 - 10:26 AM

It is usually a 3 couple dance. The A music is 1 of the usual 3 introductions. In the B music (played slow and stately) each dancer has 2 bars to hand their partner into the middle, 2 bars at the end to honour. A music dance round & back. B hand partner out. Then repeat with 2nd intro (siding) and ladies hand the men in. Then Arming.

If you had more than 3 you would need to give each couple a number 1, 2, or 3.
I call this for a sealed Knot Banquet and the organiser thinks it's simpler in a big ring, number round 1,2,3,1,2,3 etc. than fussing about making small circles.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Vixen
Date: 14 Jun 12 - 09:03 AM

Reynaud and I have played "Jenny Pluck Pears" as a 3-couple dance, but there was no caller--all the dancers knew the tune and the dance already, and they told us to play it 3 times through. I'm not a dancer, so I don't know if it's always a 3-couple dance, or if it can be expanded. It also looked pretty lively and beautifully complicated, but again, that's a non-dancer's opinion.

V

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 02:07 PM

There is a thread of suggestions on the Yahoo group "trad-dance-callers", here. I'm going to cross-post a link to this Mudcat thread there.

~ Becky in Long Beach

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: clueless don
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 08:09 AM

In the Irish Ceili Dance tradition, there is the Duke Reel.

Don

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mr Happy
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 06:06 AM

X: 1
P: The Duke of Kent's Waltz
R: waltz
Z: 2003 John Chambers
M: 3/4
L: 1/8
K: G
|:"G"gf ga g2 | "D7"f2 de fd | "G"g2 G2 G2 | G4 d2 \
| "C"e2 e2 f2 | "G"g2 d2 B2 | "Am"c2 c2 B2 | "D7"B2 A2 :|
| "D"D2 cB c2 | "G"Bd cB AG | "D"D2 cB c2 | "G"Bd cB AG \
| "C"ed cd ef | "G"gf ed cB | "Am"ed cB AG | "D7"FA GF ED |
| "G"GF GA Bc | "D"d^c de fd | "Em"g2 G2 G2 | G4 e2 \
| "C"^d2 e2 e2 | "G"^c2 d2 d2 | "D7"c2 A2 F2 | "G"G6 |]

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 05:35 AM

Not exactly 3 couples but useful for small numbers Domino 5 a dance for 5 individuals like spots on a domino. Any 32 bar jig.

I learnt it with the reels before the stars and I think it flows better from from the progression figure at the end of the previous turn, so I'll stick to that way of calling it.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 05:25 AM

Yes, we play it at Have-a-Go. I think the musicians like it, it was requested last time so I had to remember it without my card, fortunately someone had called it a couple of days before.
You could do that with just a few couples, if the changing numbers so quickly doesn't confuse - it does with some dances. But a lot of 3 couple dances were originally longways dances.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: GUEST,FloraG
Date: 13 Jun 12 - 04:33 AM

Thanks for all the suggestions so far. I've got to 21 June to look them all up. It takes me a while to get a dance in my head - I don't like to use cards, and then even longer to learn the tune to play with it. Having just a few turn up is streaching my dance knowledge.
Mo - I did the Duke of kents waltz last time. It sounded really good on my hardanger, what a nice tune. Thanks for that.
FloraG

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Bert
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 05:30 PM

I guess you could work in a version of the American Square 'Ghost Pair'

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: GUEST,Jacob B
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 02:36 PM

There are Ted's Triplets. Unless you're looking for something a bit challenging, your best bet is Ted's Triplet #3.

Borrowdale Exchange is fun. You should find instructions at the link to Thomas Green's website, above.

Of the dances I've written, there are Housewarming, Luck of the Morris, and Alice & Matt.

I don't have time now to write them down, but I'll try to get back here on Thursday or Friday to enter them.

Jacob Bloom

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: bfdk
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 11:34 AM

A couple of Danish recommendations ;-)
My favourite 3 couple dance "Den Toppede Høne fra Thy" (Crested Hen from Thy) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63XbapFrFvg
Really good fun :-) In the Thy tradition (where the dances come from) it's usually followed by "Trekantet Sløjfe fra Thy" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRLosvGRP14
This one's good fun, too. And there's even instructions in English - "Gammel Ottetur på Langs" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOLxL_prS7A

Best wishes,

Bente

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: squeezeboxhp
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 07:40 AM

Swedish Masquerade is a good one for starting weddings with the others joining in as they pick up how easy it is.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 06:22 AM

Gypsy Hill jig works well to "Off She Goes", but I'm sure other tunes fit too.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 06:12 AM

Thomas Green gives some instructions on his website.
As I remember it (and I can't find my Callers Choice, where I think it was published), Gypsy Hill jig had a Dip and Dive twice in the B1, he says stars. I do remember that the 1s have to go straight into the grand chain, not wait for the others to finish the reels on the side. As he says, you have to get a move on.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Mo the caller
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 05:44 AM

I sometimes call at a club where numbers are thin at the start and I can't start with a longways dance. So I look for 'elastic' dances that can accommodate low numbers that vary during the walkthrough.
I find that there are several dances that are officially 3 couple but will stretch with a bit of improvisation.

Epping Forest and Jovial Beggars are circle dances (Playford type) for 3(ish).
Upon a summers Day is a Playford longways for 3, if you have more than 3 you can either play the B music more times or start part 2 with a different couple at the top.

Rufty Tufty, Hit & Miss (usually danced to tune Daphne), & Heartsease are Playford dances for 2 couples and Dorset 4 hand reel and Hullichan are lively ceilidh 2 couple dances (some older folk don't like it). I was thinking last week that Rufty could be done as a 3 couple circle.

Ploughboy is a good 3 couple longways. Gypsy Hill Jig. Bonny Breast Knot - Somerset and Devon version, Shrewsbury lasses, Bishop, Fandango.
I think a lot of these were originally longways triple minor dances, i.e. danced in groups of 6 down the set. Most of them have a set tune.

Subject: RE: Best 3 couple dances
From: Jack Campin
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 05:19 AM

Why can't they just be couple dances, without any definite number of couples?

I am completely crap at any kind of dance that requires memorizing the geometry of groups of more than 2 people but I managed to pick up the csardas without much difficulty.

Subject: Best 3 couple dances
From: GUEST,FloraG
Date: 12 Jun 12 - 04:49 AM

Its the summer and if its nice weather fewer people turn up to the dance club so I could do with recommendations for a few 3 couple dances.
FloraG