Posts Tagged ‘Nelson Town Hall’
Folks in Nelson Concert
| August 14, 2010 | ||
| 7:00 pm |
As part of Old Home Day, there will be a concert at 7 PM on Saturday, August 14th at the Nelson Town Hall. Join your friends for an evening of wonderful music played by our talented Nelson neighbors or folks with strong Nelson connections. Always an enjoyable and varied show.
Tags: concert, folk music, Nelson Town Hall
Folknotes: August 2010
A western caller, Fred Feild, came across this in the March 1941 Recreation Magazine. The overall article is called “The Square Dance Goes to College.” After talking about the University of North Carolina it says this:
At John Gould Goddard College in Vermont
Assisted by teachers from the Washington County Folk Dance Association, young Vermonters study the old country dances at a mid-winter school at Goddard College.
Skiing in Vermont’s snow-covered hills and old-time dancing were friendly rivals for popular favor immediately after Christmas when the Washington County Folk Dance Association brought its summer activities up to date with a three-day school of country dances at Goddard College. And the same spirit pervaded the school as that which prevailed at the annual Vermont Folk Dance Festival in August on the college campus in Plainfield.
The city ballrooms of the nation have lately adopted country dancing with all the vigor of a new-found diversion, but to this group in Vermont folk dancing is something as old as the early “pitches” when settlers first brought cows into the Winooski valley. And since the attendance at the school turned out to be better than half school-age youngsters, it is likely that the country dances will remain a form of Saturday night recreation throughout Vermont long after city folks have taken up some new idea.
Vermont has a set of country dance traditions all its own, and several intricate dances unknown to the rest of the nation. To keep these traditions safe, the Washington County group organized many years ago for the purpose of searching out techniques and teaching them to other groups gathered solely for amusement. When the group heard that the folks down in Chelsea had a different twist on the promenade forward of a Boston Fancy, they sent someone down, and now the Chelsea tradition is known throught Vermont. During the year the group stands ready to send teachers, equipped with phonograph records and source material, anywhere in Vermont to teach country dancing – a free service that arises from a genuine love for the dance.
Throughout the year the group has bi-weekly dances at some small hall or farmhouse in Washington County, where the program is part recreation, part study. Every summer they call out competing teams from all over the state, and the lawn tennis court at Goddard College is the stage where men in white trousers and girls in peasant skirts and aprons strive to win the big silver cup. A couple of thousand Vermonters and summer visitors come to watch and applaud Money Musk, Hull’s Victory, Merry Merry Milkmaids, and dozens of similar dances done in the correct Vermont fashion.
Last summer the rising interest in this form of dance brought many out-of-staters, and Goddard College followed this success with the offer to sponsor a winter school with dormitory facilities for those coming from a distance. Emerson Lang of Danville directed the school, and its success assures annual repetitions.
Last night in Nelson, we danced a tremendous Money Musk to Dudley Laufman’s calling and the joyful accompaniment of four fiddles (Jacqueline Laufman, Dudley, Hunt Smith, and Sophie Orzechowski) and piano (Neil Orzechowski). Young and old, those who know the dance by heart, those doing it for the first time, we moved to the same notes and rhythms as the thousands who have danced before us. A good time was had by all.
Tags: Contra Dance, fiddle, folk music, Nelson Town Hall
| August 7, 2010 | ||
| 8:00 pm |
A Nelson Old Home Day Tradition
in the Nelson Town Hall
A special Nelson contra dance, taking place on the First Saturday of the month this August only (the Second Saturday is Nelson’s Old Home Day).
Thanks to an anonymous benefactor who supports the idea of Old Home Week as the time when families get together, the cost of this dance is only $2 per person.
The dance begins at 8 pm and continues until about 11 pm.
Dudley and Lacqueline Laufman, usually joined by a plethora of their excellent musician friends, bring us back to the flavor of the last generation, when the young Dudley spearheaded the contra dance revival and made Nelson the contra dance capital of the world. Old timers will bask in the rugged charm of Dudley’s calling. New dancers should come and experience this living legend.
Read about Dudley’s receipt of the National Heritage Fellowship in 2009.
Tags: Contra Dance, Nelson, Nelson Town Hall
| May 16, 2010 | ||
| 2:00 pm | to | 5:00 pm |
Join us for the Winter into Spring series of English Country Dances in the Nelson Town Hall.
Dance leader Dan Popowich will be joined by musicians Mary Lea on fiddle and Jacqueline Schwab at the piano. Daniel Popowich has been dancing and leading dance for over twenty years. Daniel is also an actor working in professional and community theatre and film throughout western Massachusetts. Mary Lea is a Brattleboro-based fiddler with a worldwide reputation for playing a wide range of dance music. Performing dance music since 1978, Mary is a founding member of Bare Necessities, known here and abroad as the benchmark of English country dance music. In the past 25 years, Mary has toured extensively throughout the United States playing for concerts, dance weeks and weekend events. Besides producing 3 solo CDs of couple dance music, Mary has played on at least 25 others, including 15 by the band Bare Necessities. Pianist Jacqueline Schwab has also toured the United States and England, inspiring people on the country dance floor through her performances with the Bare Necessities group.
Tea will be served.
Jacqueline Schwab will also present a solo piano concert that evening at 7 PM. Tickets for both the dance and concert can be purchased only in advance for the special price of $18 at http://www.monadnockfolk.org.
Beginners and singles are welcome and all dances are taught throughout the session. Admission is $10, $8 for senior citizens and students. For more information call 603.762.0235 or visit http://www.monadnockfolk.org.
Admission: $10, $8 for students, seniors
Information: contrainfo@monadnockfolk.org or (603) 762-0235
A wonderful caller will teach and prompt lovely and accessible dances that will please both English dance aficionados and those new to the pleasures of English Country Dancing.
| March 21, 2010 | ||
| 2:00 pm | to | 5:00 pm |
Join us for the Winter series of English Country Dances in the Nelson Town Hall.
Mary Jones, caller with Ethan Hazzard-Watkins, fiddle, and Julie Vallimont, piano
Sunday, March 21, 2010
2:00 – 5:00 PM
Tea will be served.
Admission: $10, $8 for students and seniors
Information: contrainfo@monadnockfolk.org or (603) 762-0235
Mary Jones will teach and prompt lovely and accessible dances that will please both English dance aficionados and those new to the pleasures of English Country Dancing.
| April 18, 2010 | ||
| 2:00 pm | to | 5:00 pm |
Join us for the Winter series of English Country Dances in the Nelson Town Hall.
Chris Levey calling with lydia ievans, fiddle, and Peter Barnes, piano and flute.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
2:00 – 5:00 PM
Tea will be served.
Admission: $10, $8 for students and seniors
Information: contrainfo@monadnockfolk.org or (603) 762-0235
A wonderful caller will teach and prompt lovely and accessible dances that will please both English dance aficionados and those new to the pleasures of English Country Dancing.
| February 21, 2010 | ||
| 2:00 pm | to | 5:00 pm |
Join us for the Winter series of English Country Dances in the Nelson Town Hall.
David Millstone calling with Thal Alward, fiddle and Carol Compton, piano
Sunday, February 21, 2010
2:00 – 5:00 PM
Tea will be served.
Admission: $10, $8 (students/seniors)
Join us for a full day of music and dance. English dancing from 2:00-5:00 and then Windborne at 7:00.
Information: contrainfo@monadnockfolk.org or (603) 762-0235
David Millstone will teach and prompt lovely and accessible dances that will please both English dance aficionados and those new to the pleasures of English Country Dancing. Carol Compton and Thal Alward provide exquisite musical accompaniment.
| January 9, 2010 | ||
| 8:00 pm |
Nelson Town Hall
Admission $8 / $6 seniors and students
Beginner’s Workshop at 7:30
The world’s most well-travelled caller, Adina Gordon, returns to the Nelson Town Hall for a fine evening of contras and other whirlygigs.
Multi-instrumentalist Danny Noveck, currently from the DC area, played with pianist Gordon Peery in the renowned band Fresh Fish in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. The join forces in part to celebrate the playing and repertoire of the late Fresh Fish founder/fiddler Kerry Elkin.
Tags: Adina Gordon, Contra Dance, Danny Noeck, Nelson Town Hall
| November 1, 2009 | ||
| 2:00 pm | to | 5:00 pm |
Join us for the second in a soon-to-be regular series of English Country Dances in the Nelson Town Hall.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
2:00 – 5:00 PM
Tea will be served.
Admission: $10, $8 for students and seniors
Rebecca Lay will teach and prompt lovely and accessible dances that will please both English dance aficionados and those new to the pleasures of English Country Dancing. Delightful music will be provided by Doug Creighton, Liz Rose and Karen Axelrod.
Folknotes: September
“Here, smell these” said my wife, handing me a bouquet of freshly picked Freesias. I inhaled deeply, but experienced no olfactory sensation. Just a couple of weeks earlier I was savoring the Summersweet that graces my front steps, and earlier in the season my daily walk brought me past purple lilacs that had a most seductive impact. In other words, there’s nothing wrong with my overall smelling mechanism, but the Freesias somehow did not engage me. This suggests that such things are more than just a matter of taste or conditioning. Perhaps it’s a brain chemistry thing.
I recall a situation (decades ago) when my day job involved a large room and lots of cubes. The employees had something of a free hand in how things worked, so we decided at one point to allow people to play recorded music in the room. There was a cassette player, and folks would bring in mostly Top 40 compilations. As it turned out, this was in the 1980’s, so the experience was not that nourishing. One day I decided to put in a tape of The Chieftains. I knew that most people in the room were probably not aware of their music, but I was so enamored of it myself that I was sure once they actually heard it, they would share my enthusiasm. I don’t recall that there were any direct complaints, but I could tell that it was a lead balloon, and not a Led Zeppelin , situation.
Clearly a large part of appreciating is cultural familiarity. But perhaps on some level each of us has (or does not have) biological or neurological components that affect our ability to experience certain kinds of music positively. It’s a curious concept which is best debated by scientists, or over a few brews in the local pub, probably with the same conclusions.
Tags: Concerts, Cosy Sheridan, folk music, Nelson Town Hall, Off the Cuff, Troy MacGillvray
