I just found a site that is selling a CD of Flash animations of square dance moves. There are some online samples, and they look like they could be helpful for visual learners.

I did find one error in the samples (and I didn’t look at all of them): For Chain Down the Line, they have the dancers doing it from a RH wave (even though their text says it should be done from a LH wave or a RH 2F lines).

At any rate, there are two CDs, one for MS and Plus, and another for Advanced. The animations let you play them in slow motion and step through them frame-by-frame. Each sells for $31.99 plus $5 S&H and can be ordered on line. The author is Bob Gartner.

Of course, once one starts to look, there are more. This one is of no interest to me because it’s only for Windo(ze/ws) machines. YMMV. Basic Mainstream Tutorial.

There are online animations here and here. With Noriko’s, I especially like the Graphical Image Training, which lets you look at a sequence and predict where a selected dancer will go after the next call. Also, Jim Penrod has some animations here.

Out of all the animations I saw, I thought the Flash ones were the best (despite the error). I couldn’t check out the PC-only one. The GIFs were not as smooth or controllable as the Flash animations. Vic Ceder has done a few JavaScript animations that look promising.

Can we tap into nostalgia? community?

Here’s an essay on why people attend state fairs. Makes interesting reading.

I use google a lot (obviously). Did you ever wonder why you might get different results for the same query sometimes? It’s the Google dance:

(to the tune Hokey Pokey)
(start the music please)

They put some pages in,
They take some pages out,
They calculate the PageRank,
Then they shake it all about,

They wait until the full moon
Then they mix the servers up,

Thats what its all about.

(dum, dum, dum)

Ooooh, do the Google Dance,
Ooooh, do the Google Dance,
Ooooh, do the Google Dance,
Thats what its all about.

From “The Update”

Never know what you’ll find:

• How about Aerobic Square Dancing for Kids?
• Pictures from a charitable dance marathon. Along with other dance types, they did some square dancing.
• Here’s a list of square and round dance fundamentals for some kind of college dance class.
• An article about old time patter calling, with info about a CD of dances recorded in the 1920’s. If that recording is anything like this one of Walter Harp calling for square dancing, March 10, 1939, the calling is hard to understand, and one understands how big a difference voice amplification has made to calling and square dancing.

Did you know you can download a database with over 9000 record entries for square dance records? Thomas Bernhed has created a PC-based (not useful for me, since I use a Mac) database of 9732 records, 1275 callers & 252 companies.

Palomino Records sells a music database with over 25,000 titles. It’s DOS-based, so, of course, it doesn’t run on a Mac either.

Vic Ceder has an online record database, which contains 2563 records, with 2027 of them having cue sheets, which can be downloaded and used by Vic’s CSDS program. What a massive amount of work!

I’m working on a database here also, but I haven’t decided yet how to present it. I’m more interested in information about the music: sort of a Casey Kasem approach. I’m also interested in real critiques of the arrangements, especially for new music; obviously American Square Dance can’t be critical; they need the advertising from the record companies. Chris Pinkham used to do reviews where one could sort of figure out his opinion by lack of praise, but the current reviewer tries to be purely descriptive.

BTW, wouldn’t it be nice if American Square Dance would put some info that would be useful in the long run (like its record reviews) on line? Also BTW, wouldn’t it be nice if American Square Dance would do something with Burlesons Encyclopedia? A couple of years ago, Ed Juaire said they were working on a digital version, but I’ve heard nothing since. I’d sure like to be able to (a) get a current version and (b) be able to look things up quickly (like on a computer).

Did you know that the Round Dancers have a toll free phone number that one can call and get information about round dancing anywhere? I just called it (sorry for the expense, Roundalab), expecting maybe an answering machine or maybe a computerized set-up, but getting a real person, who happily gave me information on round dancing in Albuquerque (two teachers, only one of whom is active, as far as I know), and then got a little suspicious when I started asking more questions. I gather the line is paid for by Roundalab, and staffed by volunteers…maybe they have a system where the number can be forwarded to various volunteers’ home phones.

I’ve occasionally wondered how we would handle some kind of national publicity (fantasy alert: what if Oprah Winfrey decided to take up square dancing and plug it on her show…). Who would she tell her audience to call? What URL could she give? The Western Square Dancing page is fine for people who already square dance, but it’s not designed for people just starting out. And we have no national toll-free number, as far as I know.

BTW, the domain learntosquaredance.com is owned by Windsor Music Archives, which also owns windsorrecords.com and windsormusic.com. Actually, Windsor Music Archives contact person is Jeff Ruff, aka Cody Bryant, who’s the son of Bob Ruff, a square dance caller. Wonder what Cody’s plans are? Is he going to go back to his square dance calling roots?

Did you know that you can have your own domain name for anywhere between $9 and $35 a year?

Here are some advantages that, for me, make it a well-spent $15:

• Unlimited email addresses: Most domain name registrars (I use Directnic will let you set up email forwarding, including a catchall address. This means I can use amazon@squarez.com when I log into Amazon, junk@squarez.com when I give my email address to some marketer, etc. All of these are automatically forwarded to the email address provided by my ISP. I can then set up my email program to filter out anything addressed to junk@squarez.com.
• A permanent email address: As long as you pay your $15/year to keep your domain, it’s yours. You can change your ISP; all you need to do is change the email forwarding information and your correspondents don’t need to know.
• An easy-to-remember URL for your web page: Most domain name registrars will let you set up domain name forwarding. This means you can host your web page anywhere, and set up your personal domain name to point to that page. For example, if (I’m not) I were hosting SquareZ at geocities, I could set squarez.com to point to http://www.geocities.com/Nashville/xxxx/index.html. So no one would need to remember the geocities address; they could get there through my own domain name.
• A permanent URL: Again, as long as you keep your domain name, you can change where you actually host your web pages and no one needs to know. Links to your page will still work.
• Bannerless web pages: Well, you don’t get this for $15/year; you’ll probably need to pay somebody to host your pages without advertising. This is my own bias; I think banners and especially pop-ups are tacky. But with your own domain name, you have a lot of freedom in where you host your pages, and you can find some relatively inexpensive hosting solutions. Maybe you could even find a friend who would let you use their web host. I host pages for the Albuquerque Square Dance Center and Square Dance Women.
• Name brand recognition: It’s just a little cooler to type in “tonyoxendine.com” rather than “www.aol.com/homepages/blahblahblah”. Or “dosado.com” Or “squaredancing.com”.

Are all the good domain names taken? Certainly the first ones you might think of for square dancing at the .com TLD (Top Level Domain) are in use. However, here are some that aren’t:

• 24-7-squaredance.com
• allsquaredance.com
• best-squaredance.com
• bestsquaredance.com
• better-squaredance.com
• bettersquaredance.com
• cyber-squaredance.com
• cybersquaredance.com
• easy-squaredance.com
• easysquaredance.com
• more-squaredance.com
• moresquaredance.com
• online-squaredance.com
• onlinesquaredance.com
• real-squaredance.com
• realsquaredance.com
• squaredance-24-7.com
• squaredance-central.com
• squaredance-city.com
• squaredance-direct.com
• squaredance-help.com
• squaredance-land.com
• squaredance-mania.com
• squaredance-megasite.com
• squaredance-music.com
• squaredance-nation.com
• squaredance-now.com
• squaredance-online.com
• squaredance-planet.com
• squaredance-plus.com
• squaredance-quest.com
• squaredance-radio.com
• squaredance-space.com
• squaredance-supersite.com
• squaredance-tech.com
• squaredance-time.com
• squaredance-town.com
• squaredance-universe.com
• squaredance-web.com
• squaredance-world.com
• squaredance-zone.com
• squaredanceandmore.com
• squaredancecenter.com
• squaredancecity.com
• squaredancedirect.com
• squaredancegalaxy.com
• squaredancehelp.com
• squaredanceland.com
• squaredancemania.com
• squaredancemegasite.com
• squaredancemusic.com
• squaredancenation.com
• squaredancenetwork.com
• squaredanceonline.com
• squaredanceplanet.com
• squaredancesale.com
• squaredancespace.com
• squaredancetech.com
• squaredancetime.com
squaredancetower.com
• squaredancetown.com
• squaredanceuniverse.com
• squaredanceweb.com
• squaredancewizard.com
• squaredancezone.com
• super-squaredance.com
• supersquaredance.com
• your-squaredance.com
• yoursquaredance.com

Plus, there are other TLDs available: .name, .us, .info, .tv, .biz. American Square Dance magazine has changed from “dosido.com” (which now goes to “dosado.com”) to “squaredance.ws”. “Ws” is the TLD for Western Samoa…but we could think about it as referring to “western squares”.

When should we celebrate square dancing?

According to this site, January 24 is Square Dance Day. But according to this listing of Bizarre November Holidays, November 29 is Square Dance Day. November 29 is also listed here: Dancing Days, which includes a lot of other dancing “holidays”, including my favorite on May 14, National Dance Like a Chicken Day.

Almost all of the special events calendars lists November 29 as Square Dance Day. But of course, there can never be too many days to square dance, so we might as well take January 24 also, not to mention the entire month of September, which is International Square Dance Month. And a site for Resident Hall Directors lists September 14 as “Learn to Square Dance” day.

This year, November 29 falls on the Friday after Thanksgiving. If you have a lot of energy, this could be a good day to organize a new dancer dance, write a media press release about an open-to-the-public square dance on Square Dance Day, talk about what a good idea it would be to work off a few of those excess calories from the overindulgence of the day before, and just see if people would come out and have some fun. It might work…

Nice article on square dancing from a weight loss perspective: Fun with Fitness

I spent the weekend in the Bay Area, calling a dance for the Diablo Dancers in Walnut Creek, and visiting friends. It was a lot of fun.

Water aerobics anyone? I’ve called a dance for people in a swimming pool; dive thru is always a real treat. Here’s a Square dance aquatic exercise pattern.

In 2003, we may suddenly see a bunch of 10-year-olds learning to square dance. Sound unlikely? Yeah, but never underestimate the power of a good children’s book.

In 1993, Sandra Boynton published “Barnyard Dance!”, a board book for pre-schoolers featuring a square dance for animals:

Stand with the donkey, Slide with the Sheep!
Scramble with the little chicks, Cheep Cheep Cheep!
With an Oink and a Moo and Cock-a-doodle-doo,
Another little promenade two-by-two!

Most of us know Sandra Boynton through her greeting cards (“Hippo Birdy Two Ewes” is a classic), but she also writes children’s books and songs. I came across “Barnyard Dance!” while reading books to a one-year-old friend of mine, and, of course, immediately went into total patter-chant caller mode. But the cadence of the rhymes is so great that even non-callers can get that patented, old-time caller sound.

I love this review of “Barnyard Dance!”…Beowulf, anyone?

The words in “Barnyard Dance!” have been incorporated into a song on the Rhinocerous Tap CD. You can hear it here.

So think of all the pre-schoolers who are getting a totally positive exposure to the idea of square dancing. Maybe when they’re old enough, they’ll decide they want to “swing your partner once or twice.”

Yesterday, at the Huntsman World Senior Games 2002, there was a square dance competition. I couldn’t find any rules or procedures for the event on the web site.

At the 2002 California State Square Dance Convention, there was a youth square dance competition. Sixteen dancers participated, and they used a format similar to that used by the Pacific Northwest Teen Square Dance Competition: each square’s actual dance time is tracked, and the square that danced the most wins.

I think this fits the idea of MWSD better than some competition based on style, appearance, and tricky pre-planned choreography (although that’s certainly how most other dance contests are judged). I personally dislike practicing the same thing over and over to make it look perfect, but I like the idea of practicing problem-solving so that dancers can cope with whatever the caller calls.

Canadians seem much more into square dance competitions…maybe that’s why they have more teenagers who square dance or maybe they have more competitions because they have more teenagers who square dance (chicken and egg?). I had an article that mentioned a square dance competition at Guelph University. I also found this page on a square dance competition for a Quebec Young Farmers group. The Pacific Northwest Teen event is often held in Canada.

This whole article was brought on by an article at CircleLeft by Bud Wolkins: Where Do We Go From Here on why we should introduce competition into MWSD. Although I’m not a particularly competitive person, I agree that competition might help attract more people to square dancing, although I disagree with Bud’s judging criteria: “Judging could be done on correct moves (goodbye Hungarian Swing), dancing attire, facial expression (are they having a good time?), are they dancing to the beat of the music, and dancing the correct number of beats for each move. (Anyone remember how many beats for Grand Square?)” All of these things are important, but the major difference between MWSD and other dance forms is the dancers’ ability to solve choreographic puzzles in real time, and I’d like to see that added to the judging.