Michael Dyck's Contradance Index

... indexing contradances since 1996 ...

(Wondering what contradance is? Try this set of links.)


Last updated 2012 March 31: 9617 records, 6767 distinct titles.

Title
Author

Recent updates:

Dec 28 wDevlin Index Mary Devlin's website (Thanks to Chris Page for data entry.) (4 dances).
Dec 30   Chris Page supplies many additions to the to-do list.
Dec 30 wKermiet Index Chris Kermiet's website (3 dances) (Thanks to Chris Page for data entry.).
Dec 31 wRPDLW_2010 Index "Syllabus of the 23rd Annual Ralph Page Dance Legacy Weekend" by David Smukler (81 dances). (Much thanks to Chris Page for data entry.)
Jan 13 wCalhoun 1 dance added ("The Jealous Lover").
Jan 13 wCoffman 7 dances added ("Birds and Bees", "The Boys from Urbana", "Camden's Cap and Gown", "Chicken on a Leash", "Drama in Middle School", "Muscle Baby", "Stimulus Package").
Jan 13 wFischle 1 dance added ("Wirrwar").
Jan 13 wGoss 2 dances added ("Jenny's Trip to Seattle", "Knit the Knot").
Jan 28 NRftW Index "No Rest for the Wicked" by Tom Hinds (40 dances). (Thanks to Tom for a copy of the book!)
Jan 29 wCoffman 2 dances added ("Insider Trading", "Luck Be a Lady").
Jan 29 wDVA 4 dances changed ("Du Quoin Races", "Hay in the Barn", "Plucking Daisy Petals", "Seesaw Surfer"); 18 dances added ("Alternating Current", "Broken Sixpence", "Chama River Reel", "Chicken on a Leash", "Double Dip", "Drama in Middle School", "Fast Hands", "Fast Living", "Groundhog Daze", "Heyllamande", "Ice Cream in the Sink", "Renewal", "Sasha", "Stimulus Package", "The Big Chit Chat", "The Edgy Knitter", "The Square English Contra", "The Third Time's the Charm").
Jan 29 wHemphill 1 dance removed ("The Courtesy Fling"); 16 dances added ("A Becket Full of Butterflies", "Butterfly Bonanza", "The Celestial Butterfly", "Chasing Chickens", "A Fond Farewell", "Going Our Opposite Waves", "Groundhog Daze", "Heyllamande", "The Inversion Reel", "Macho Man", "Passing Peggy", "Rollercoaster Ride", "Run Rooster Run", "The Square English Contra Dance", "Twirling Girls", "Wave to you Neighbor").
Jan 29 wJack Index Nathaniel Jack's website (8 dances) (Thanks to Chris Page for the data entry.).
Jan 29 wKermiet 1 dance added ("Movin' at the Merc, #2").
Jan 29 wKrackau 15 dances added ("A Little Bit Of Sunshine", "A Nice Combination", "B & B", "Belstead House", "I Left My Partner", "Johnson's Special", "Leaving Of Liverpool", "May Day Mixer", "Pleasant Anticipation", "Rachel", "Reel Habits", "Sally Goddin", "Solomon Levi", "Up Jumped The Devil", "Virginia Reel").
Jan 29 wRavitz 6 dances added ("Crosswalk", "Double Whirl", "Mad Max", "Songbird", "Southern Spring", "Winter Wind").
Mar 22 CDSSN 1 dance modified: Robert's Reel is a 3-couple set, not triple minor. [Thanks to trad-dance-callers group for sorting it out.]
Mar 31 wCoffman 11 dances added ("Another Runaround", "Bee in Her Bonnet", "Behind Closed Doors", "Half Way Home", "Heaven and Earth", "Hemphill's Chicks", "National Glazed Ham Day", "Pay Dirt", "Rolling in the Aisles", "The Runaround", "Turkey Talk").
Mar 31 wCrane 1 dance added ("Odd Meetings").
Mar 31 wDVA 4 dances changed ("Hay in the Barn", "Karen's Kool Kurls", "Spring Fever", "Wild Hemp"); 12 dances added ("All You Can Eat", "Carpet Vectors", "David's Triplet #5", "Gypsy in the Hey", "Invertro Flirtilization", "Paula's Promenade", "Shaking Out the Bees", "Swingshot", "The Elegant Trogon", "Three Thirty Three", "Venus and Mars", "Willow Ware").
Mar 31 wHemphill 3 dances added ("Gypsy in the Hey", "SEMO Do Si Do", "Wild Hemp").
Mar 31 wKaufman 2 dances added ("Just Because", "Trip To Lambertville").
Mar 31 wKrackau 7 dances added ("Anne's A Bride Tonight", "Bicentennial Reel", "Four Around Four", "Modern Trend", "Split Up", "Star Treck", "Wishy Washy").
Mar 31 wPage 2 dances changed ("SwingCatcher", "24/7"); 12 dances added ("Mash-Up Mixer", "Double Joy", "Do-Si-Did", "Gemini Six", "Promenade Home", "Surprise Through", "Uplift", "Wander Rings", "The Weaving Sloop", "The Zen of Dance", "Curves and Ways", "Minor Hey").
Mar 31 wSmuklerD Change URL.
Mar 31 wSouthard 2 dances added ("Dawn's Early Light", "Sailboat at Sunset").
Mar 31 wTepfer 5 dances added ("Pigtown Pousette", "Swingshot v2", "Swingshot v1.5", "Bottom of the Ninth", "Bases Loaded").
Mar 31 wWhitehead Change URL.

My goal for this web site is to index every contra dance ever published. Moreover, I intend to include any other country dances that are published alongside contras. By "published", I mean in a book, booklet, newsletter, or on the World-Wide Web.

I'm not trying to index every publication, just the ones that have appeared since 1953. (If you know of any I'm missing, please let me know!) I chose that cutoff because "The Contra Dance Book" by Rickey Holden "is a compilation of all the contra and progressive circle dances which have appeared in readily available American literature between 1850 and 1953." So by indexing that book (CDBH), I'm claiming to cover all the contras published up to 1953.

For each dance, I have the following info:

Publication Info
This consists of a book (or newsletter) identifier and a page number (or dance number, if they're numbered). Eventually, I'll have the full publication info somewhere.
Dance Title
Pretty straightforward.
Authorship
Usually this is a single author, but sometimes it's more than one, either working together or one adapting the other.
Formation
I've let myself be a bit cryptic on this. And then numbers defining the composition of each (minor) set, and then optional stuff indicating whether each couple is proper or improper, and whether it's a mixer.

Note that I do not include the figures of the dances. If you're looking for on-line country dance descriptions, check my list of sources for codes that begin with 'w'.

Here's my to-do list, including links to lots more websites containing contra dances that I haven't indexed yet.


And now, the indexes:

My list of sources, the codes I use to denote them, and my raw data files are all available here.


Website by Michael Dyck, jmdyck@ibiblio.org

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