Browse Items (1934 total)
Sort by:
Still Image
Brasstown Callers
The six callers at Dare To Be Square, Brasstown, NC, 2011. They are also consultants to this Square Dance History Project. From left to right: Phil Jamison, Bill Litchman, Larry Edelman, Tony Parkes,… View itemMoving Image
Phil Jamison 4 - Cecil Sharp and the "running set"
Phil discusses the origins of the term "running set," going back to when the English folklorist and collector Cecil Sharp first encountered southern Appalachian dancing.For a demonstration of the… View itemMoving Image
Phil Jamison 3 - The caller's role in Southern squares
The square dance caller in Southern dance traditions plays a somewhat different role than his Northern counterpart. Phil looks at the way a Southern caller improvises and uses basic figures in… View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 6 - Key Elements of Modern Square Dance
Jim discusses features that make modern square dancing different from traditional squares, including the unpredictable nature of the calls, the necessity for lessons, and the club structure that… View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 5 - Basic Formations, Complex Calls
Jim points out that there are only a few basic formations in modern square dancing. One of the distinctive features of modern squares is the way that a series of basic moves are combined into one… View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 4 - New choreography
New calls such as Wheel and Deal and Swing Thru gave modern square dance callers powerful tools for creating new choreography and patterns of movement. Callers discovered that the sequence "Wheel… View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 3 - Start of CALLERLAB
The 1970s saw a dramatic increase in the number of calls, which led to repeated cries from dancers for someone to bring order out of chaos. This led to the formation of CALLERLAB. View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 2 - Square Thru and Changing Choreography
The call "square through" provided callers with a new tool for moving dancers around on the dance floor. Jim describes how callers experimented with the figure and how he introduced it in… View itemMoving Image
Jim Mayo 1 - Early Years of Modern Square Dance
Jim discusses his own introduction to modern squares with caller Al Brundage in 1949. He talks about the early development of modern, showing how this new activity began to separate from its… View itemMoving Image
Phil Jamison 2: African influences, and African-American callers
Phil Jamison discusses his research into the origins of American square dance in the south, and describes the key role that African-American musicians played . There are the well-known musical… View itemMoving Image
Phil Jamison 1: Southern Appalachian Dance
Dance caller, musician, and historian Phil Jamison discusses the distinguishing characteristics of southern Appalachian square dance forms. View item
Sort by: