Browse Items (186 total)

"Rufus!" is a 30-minute film made in 1990 that celebrates the life and music of Newfoundland fiddler Rufus Guinchard. The film is available online, and is well worth watching in its entirety. Like Medicine Fiddle, the film helps set the music and…

Piute Pete called squares regularly at the Village Barn in New York City. This newspaper columnist took a less-than-enthusiastic view of the proceedings.

Canadian caller, born 1900, who was the caller for Don Messer's bands on its many cross-country trips. A three-LP boxed set of his dance calls (Let's Square Dance) was released (Doncaster DS-3-102). Father of fiddler Graham Townsend.Here's a…

Armstrong took the figures from Ralph Page's "Gents and Corners" dance and set them to a popular tune, creating a well-known singing square. A cue sheet for the dance is available from the Lloyd Shaw Foundation.

Another recording of Pony Boy (full length)

Recorded by the Ralph Page Trio, to the tune of Girl I Left Behind Me (Disc 364)

Duke Miller was a square dance caller (and a wrestling coach) in Gloversville, NY, and later became a popular caller for summertime dances in the Monadnock region of southwestern New Hampshire. His regular dances in Peterborough and Fitzwilliam…

Lawrence Loy was from western Massachusetts but this recording, with its apt title, shows the influence of the western style of dance, with changing choreography.

After generic opening figures, two head couples lead to the right, circle once…

Audio clip of Chris Sanderson calling with the Pocopson Valley Boys, popular caller and band from southeastern Pennsylvania.

Opening figure: Bow to your partner, Bow to your corner, hands all around, the other way, swing that corner gal, swing…

A Roman Catholic wedding (1967) in the church in Joe Batt's Arm South on Fogo Island, Newfoundland; then a party afterward with music and dancing in Joe Batt's Arm North.

There appears to be no way to jump through the wedding sequence to get to…

Traditional Newfoundland square dancing in the early 1990's. Tunes played on the accordion are: Off She Goes, Mussels in the Corner, and Rode up in a Dory. The dances are performed by many of the locals Fogo Island. This dance is a double quadrille,…

Harbour Deep was a Newfoundland logging and fishing community that no longer exists; when the cod fishery collapsed, the town disappeared, with the last residents leaving in 2002. This documentary from 1980 shows a four-couple traditional dance from…