Square Phobia
Jim Saxe
to call than contras, at least for callers used to calling contras:
1. There is more stuff for the caller to keep track of. The caller
must remember--or improvise--chorus figures (intros, breaks,
endings) as well as the main figure of each dance, and the main
figures often must be called differently as heads and sides (or
successive couples) take the lead. Moreover, it's not uncommon
for the figure of a square to be more than 32 bars long.
2. Because squares are not strictly repetitive, the dancers are
more dependent on the caller for accurate, unambiguous, and
timely calls (often to music played at a faster tempo than is
common for contras), whereas in contras they can rely on memory
and the music.
A more subtle point has to do with the differing, albeit overlapping,
sets of skills involved in contradancing and in ("traditional") square
dancing. For example:
* Contradancing tends to exercise the skill of memorizing sequences;
square dancing tends to exercise the skill of listening for and
reacting to possibly unexpected calls.
* Dancers who do a lot of contras learn (without necessarily verbalizing
it) that they can usually recover from a major goof by simply moving
to progressed position and waiting for the next turn of the dance;
dancers who do a lot of squares learn where to find their new
corner after a partner change.
* Dancers who do lots of contras get used to dealing with a 180-degree
change of orientation after reaching the end of the set; dancers who
do a lot of squares get used to dealing with 90-degree changes of
orientation as the lead switches between heads and sides, or as the
women (or sometimes the men) progress around the square.
In a community where contras normally predominate and squares are
relatively rarely called, the _average_ level of development of
square-specific skills will generally be lower than the _average_ level
of development of contra skills. For example, there may be a significant
fraction of dancers who haven't mastered the distinction between "right
and left through" and "pass through," so that one or more squares may
break down if the caller says "right and left through" without
immediately prompting a courtesy turn or, conversely, if the caller says
"pass through" and then allows enough time for dancers to (incorrectly)
start a courtesy turn before calling the next figure (e.g., "separate" or
"turn alone", or "arch in the middle, ends duck through"). Yet the same
floor might have no difficulty handling a transition like
B2. Ladies lead a hey for four (starting by right shoulders).
A1. Star right with new neighbors.
in a no-walk-through contra. [It's not so much a matter of inherent
difficulty as one of familiarity; it would probably be risky to call a
sequence like
...
Swing partner (on the side of the set),
Circle left 3/4.
Right and left through (ALONG the set).
Balance and swing neighbor.
in a contra medley anywhere in the country.]
The illusion that contradance skill equates directly to square dance
skill can trip up both callers and dancers. The caller who sees a fairly
skilled (on average) bunch of contradancers on the floor is apt to expect
that he can sail through a square of medium complexity with the same kind
of sketchy teaching that he has been getting away with on the contras.
(I could tell stories about how I've made this mistake, but this posting
is long enough as it is.) Similarly, dancers are likely to expect they
(and their neighbors) can get away with the same kind of sketchy
listening that they've been getting away with on the contras. When these
expectations aren't met, dancers come away grumbling that squares are too
confusing, take too long to teach, are unsatisfying to dance, etc.
--Jim Saxe <sa...@src.dec.com>