Browse Items (112 total)

Three examples of big sets from western North Carolina, called by Glenn Bannerman with music from the Stoney Creek Boys. These audio files come from two recordings, "Mountain Dance Music Comes Alive" and "Appalachian Clog Dancing and Big Circle…

Recent years have seen the appearance of a new audience for square dances. One important starting point was a series of dances in the Portland, Oregon, area, led by caller Bill Martin and the Foghorn Stringband. Those dances featured old-time…

Birdie in the Cage is a traditional square dance figure and a common one; a search for "birdie" on this SDHP website will bring up more than half a dozen other examples. In this version, each of the "birdies" fly out in turn to join another square…

This is another example of traditional southern Appalachian big set square dance, recorded by John Ramsay in Carcassonne, Kentucky, September 19, 1991. This clip has a different caller from Carcassonne #1. With relatively few examples on our site of…

This is an excellent example of traditional southern Appalachian big set square dance, recorded by John Ramsay in Carcassonne, Kentucky, September 19, 1991. The tune is Liza Jane. We do not yet know the identity of the caller and would appreciate…

see previous item The grapevine twist figure in this dance is taught by Phil Jamison in another video in this collection.

The caller is Corbett Grigsby, with music provided by fiddler Marion Sumner and guitarists Martin Young and Roscoe Holcomb. Grigsby introduces the figure as "around behind, lady in the lead."This footage was recorded by filmmaker George Pickow at the…

Larry Edelman produced this video in 1987 while studying square dance calling with Jerry Goodwin. The apprenticeship was supported by a grant from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. Recorded at the Prosperity Fire Hall in western…

Article by Karen terHorst describes dancing in New Salem, Georgia, an historically-isolated community above Chattanooga, TN. The article is based on her visit to the dance in the 1970s. The dance stopped taking place sometime around 1990.

"New…

Article by LeeEllen Friedland describing the social setting for community dances as well as the dance figures themselves. She differentiates among three types of dance: single dancing, couple dancing and group dancing. Folklorist Burt Feintuch…

Description from 1949 by Patrick Napier of traditional square dances in eastern Kentucky.

Article by Patrick E. Napier, originally published in 1949, describing a Kentucky dance figure and its setting.