Calling in Los Angeles

[cjsmith]

I am mostly pleased with my calling during this past weekend. The dancers clearly enjoyed it, the level was appropriate with just the right amount of challenge, and I'm slowly getting better at using the music.

I did do one thing which is well-supported by common usage but which is technically not legal. I'm kicking myself a bit for that. I am sure only one person on the floor noticed at all, but still I want to keep very high standards for that sort of thing. The dancers deserve it. It's time for me to re-read the definitions!

And I am happy with my ability to tailor the level to the floor, to come up with workshop material, and to call just a little bit better to the music. That's all good.

When I first started learning to call I had no idea I would still be doing it more than fourteen years later. If someone told me I'd be internationally known for it I'd have thought "escapee from the funny farm". As it turns out both these things are true, and I'm still learning!

Comments

[zipperbear]

You say that a one-faced Bend the Line has some people (presumably the Centers) staying in the same place. But that's a very snap-to-matrix way to look at it. Consider doing it in Facing Lines. Then the Centers would back up, while the Ends effectively Partner Tag. A better way to think of it is like a 2-faced line, with Centers backing up, Ends moving forward, as each couple pivots around their handhold.

For lopsided formations, consider the general case of Step and Slide. The Centers can each be facing either direction; they will move to the End spots of a Phantom Column of 6, while the Ends slide in, to take the spots of the original Centers. If the Centers were facing opposite directions, the ending formation is a Z. If the Centers were facing the same direction, the ending formation is a general Box of 4 for the real people, but it's actually a Phantom Column of 6, with lopsided real people. The Ends were moving into existing spots within the formation, while the Centers created new spots, and the vacated original End spots were simply discarded.

For the purposes of square-breathing, it's those original Center spots that are aligned. You can breathe to make room for the spots you created (e.g., Step and Slide starting in Facing Lines), or for the spots you discarded (e.g., Step and Slide starting in Tidal Waves, ending in Z's in Triple Wave footprints, not Z's far apart), but you can't breathe for only the real people (e.g., Step and Slide starting in Tidal 1-Faced Lines, which creates Triple Lines, without breathing backward to make Parallel 2-Faced Lines).

In the case of Here Comes the Judge, one dancer is leaving the 1x4 matrix, looping to the far end, while the other 3 dancers are staying within the original matrix.

Conversely, the call Hinge is always interpreted as a 2-person shape-changer with normal breathing; each dancer is moving along a curved path (regardless of whether they're moving along the same semicircle as in Partner Hinge, or opposite semicircles as in Single Hinge); the new mini-wave always breathes to align with the original handhold. As another example, 1/2 Circulate in Facing Lines or Back-to-Back Lines always creates a Tidal Wave, even though the Back-to-Back case should leave 2 phantoms in the very center, as happens with T-boned Circulates. When dancers collide with right hands, they can breathe inward if necessary to fill the normal spots.

Similarly, 1/2 Run is conventionally a 2-person breather, even though the definition and dance-action have one dancer sliding/moving directly into the vacated spot, while the other dancer moves along a semicircle (which should finish lopsided). I believe this falls under the "Mainstream breathe-for-Fold" hand-waving. Trying to make the "real" ending formation wouldn't be useful, so we just do it like Hinge.

With larger formations, however, it's possible to maintain the offset. Those of use who think Here Comes the Judge is like Step and Slide will do it space-invadingly. Those who think it's like Threesome-by-1 Belles Run might do it breathingly.

A careful reading of the definitions would suggest that the standard interpretation of 1/2 Run is problematic, however, and we shouldn't rely on such a shaky example.