Take Two
Well, here’s something I never thought I’d say… This is the second collection of dances which I have published! As with the first collection, there is no set theme, I hear a tune I like and then write a dance to fit. I did seem to go through a bit of a Scottish and waltzes phase in this book but trust me it was not intentional!
For Andrew
This dance is dedicated to my closest friend of 20 years, Andrew. Andrew is like a brother to me, the best kind of friend, we can go for days even weeks without talking, but when we do talk it’s like we spoke yesterday. He knows me better than anybody outside my family, and I cannot put into words how grateful I am to have him as a friend. Andrew is not a dancer, but I’m sure he knows what it means for me to write a dance for him.
To the Moon and Back
This is one those dances which has a significant amount of meaning behind it. I wrote it the day after my Great Nan passed away in October 2022 aged 94! Her surname was Moon, so I had the title before I had written the dance, a real rarity for me. I originally wrote it with the 1s improper, and it just didn’t feel ‘right’. So, I must thank Colin Hume who suggested making the 2s improper which made it feel a whole lot nicer, so thank you Colin!
Changing Times
I wrote this dance purely as a display dance, there is no progression. You dance it once as a strathspey and then straight in to dance it again as a reel, which gives it a totally different feel!
Your Reluctant Chairman
One afternoon there were a load of emails pinging between members of the committee for Rutland Folk Dance Club. Our chairman Colin Trevor (who hates triple minors with a passion!) signed off the final email with “Your reluctant chairman. Great name for a dance, maybe a triple minor?”. As you can imagine my response went “That’s a red rag to a bull, give me 10 minutes!”. This is the dance that followed.
Autumn Days at Halsway
This is a truly beautiful tune. It is available on Bandcamp if you would like to download it (which I would of course recommend). I wrote the dance while at Halsway Manor, thank you to Rosemary & Steve Hunt, and Bernie Culkin who walked it through with me one afternoon, after I’d had the idea for the main A figure. It was at that point we realised that whoever wasn’t active had to stand around for 16 bars, and that was when the dance got a whole lot busier!
The Rutland Roundabout
This is one of those tunes that had been on my ‘dance writtng radar’ for a li;le while but took me ages to actually get one wri;en. Once I had the idea though for the interlocking reels, it all came together relatively quickly.
Statoca House
Jonny sent me this tune a/er I was in touch with him about the phrasing for the waltzes to go with ‘A Distinguished Gentleman’. The title is an acronym for ‘Set, Turn, And Trip Over Cat Again’. Unsurprisingly it’s a lockdown tune from when we were all dancing in our living rooms and inevitably tripping over the pets who were always under our feet! When Jonny sent me the tune, I already had my 12 dances for this book, but I decided to bin off one of my other dances (which I wasn’t overly keen on anyway) so this one could be included. It is also the first dance I have written in 3/2 time, so I hope you enjoy it.
Passing Dolphins
I can’t remember exactly why I wrote this dance, apart from this track being an absolute corker! My thanks to Susan Parkin who recommended the variation on the last half reel in A2. Susan also helped me to write this notation out in a way that made sense. Believe you me, it was harder than it should’ve been!
A Hollingshurst’s Delight
I wrote this dance for Dan & Caroline Hollingshurst of Folkus Pocus. There is a beautiful recording of Ashokan Farewell on their CD ‘Under no Illusion’ which I had never listened to in full until I was on a dog walk one morning and I suddenly thought ‘I should write a dance to this for Dan & Caroline!’ By the time I got home about an hour later I had the dance written.
New Year’s Magot; or, What Day is it?
I wrote this dance in December 2023, in that horrible period in between Christmas and New Year, when nobody has any idea what day it is or what they are supposed to be doing! For some reason I couldn’t get the tune ‘Grimstock’ out of my head so the only reasonable solution for me was to write a dance to it. I found a recording online that I really like which had 4x B sections making it a full 32 bars which I liked, about 30 mins later I had the dance!
A Distinguished Gentleman
I wrote this dance after John Moy, a member of Titchmarsh Folk Dance Club, passed away in July 2024 after a lengthy battle with cancer. John was always immaculately dressed, so the title seemed fitting.
Salute to Rabbie Burns
As the )tle suggests, I wrote this dance for our Burns night celebra)ons at Rutland Folk Dance Club. I was calling half the evening with Peter Meacock. As many of the dances I was calling were ScoFsh 4cpl sets, I wanted to add a longways to the programme so I thought I’d write one for the evening. This dance is the result.