"Do you realise there were 34 stick clashes in each chorus of that dance and 5 chorii" said Clive. That's 170 clashes per dance.
"Well we did it at least 10 times through, so with the walk throughs and individual figure/chorus practices we must have done around 2,000 clashes each tonight, and all with the right arm" said I.
"Good job I'm left handed" said Tony raising his pint without a tremble.
Yes, Mersey had survived. Richard, the Foreman had b*****ed off to Cyprus for a week in the sun and nominated Paul as stand in. Are forepersons born sadists, do they achieve sadism or do they have sadism thrust upon them?
Paul had arrived with H, Mrs M and Glyn-the-stick-smasher from Clerical Error. Rumour had it they had been looking for Willaston since leaving home early on Boxing Day morning.
Do border sides black up to disguise the boredom of standing still for 5 min at a time beating sticks together? Fortunately we were allowed to rediscover our legs periodically to charge round in circles screaming as the circulation returned to the extremities.
The figures were fascinating and we particularly liked "car crash". Paul's instructions were to have faith and run straight across the set. "You won't hit anyone" we were told. Well the ambulance arrived suprisingly fast (the hospital's only a couple of miles away) and the blood stains were largely soaked up by the fragments of broken sticks which liberally covered the floor.
We diagnosed the problem. Clive and Nev both had faith but being gentlemen of more than a certain age they kept forgetting what they had faith in. The second time was better and we managed to get John into the ambulance before it set off with the previous wounded.
This left us with just enough for a full set so Mrs M took pity and pointed out that we were not all supposed to charge towards the centre of the set with our eyes closed but form a sort of roundabout in the middle of the set. "Oh is that what I've been doing wrong for all these years" said Paul.
Matthew 2 (we now have three Matthew's so we've numbered them in order of time with the side) survived a sideswipe in the face with a stick and the doctor says his jaw should be mended again in a couple of months. Apparently Guinness just doesn't taste the same through a straw.
Bobby Shaftoe went to sea, silver buckles on his knee....
God I wish I could get rid of that tune in my head, will the nightmare never end!
Rumour has it we're going to consolidate next Monday, I'd better check the details of
the Ring insurance cover.
Alan Barber
170 clashes later and we had used Craven Stomp as a warm up to start Mersey's weekly practice. Glyn the stick smasher had again been successful - looks like another trip to the woods is needed soon.
Richard, the Foreman, is back from Cyprus so we switch to a night of Cotswold, but only after a telling question to our Border tutors:-
"Why do Border Sides always insist on making those falsetto girly screeches?"
Shock registers on Glyn and Paul's faces.
"What's wrong with a deeply voiced manly growl?" expands Richard - never known for tact.
Shock changes to puzzlement.
"Don't know" chorus Paul and Glyn.
"Why don't you ask the MDDL Alan" says Paul with a malicious glint in his eye, knowing a sucker when he sees one. "Maybe someone from Silurian will read it and be able to explain". "Give them Richard's address and they'll probably pay him a visit.
Well, in the spirit of academic investigation, any suggestions?
Alan Barber (don't shoot the messenger).
.. actually, the manly growls accompany the sticking, and the manic screeches go with the running about bits in between.
It's actually quite hard to do a growly scream.
Richard Walton Hook Eagle Morris Men
A good bloodcurdling whoop (known also by the pejorative appellation of ("falsetto girly screech") makes it sound like you're having a good time.
A deeply voiced manly growl makes it sound like you're trying to kill something, or, possibly, you're constipated.
It's a matter of taste, of course, and I know some teams that go more for growling than whooping in border morris. Personally I detest the growling. But that's just me. (And my team, since I'm the assistant fore in charge of border.)
And of course, there are plenty of other types of nonverbal vocalization available besides those two, and any that the audience and, for that matter, the dancers themselves are likely to associate with exuberant insane joie-de-vivre, as opposed to gastrointestinal distress, are OK by me.
Rich Holmes - Flying Bark Morris, Newport News, VA
We've probably been here before but as a matter of interest, is there any evidence for these in the records of collected/recorded border dances? I don't have it in front of me, but I have no recollection of any mention of such utterances in Jones' book which I take to be as authoritative in the matter and as complete a synthesis of the earlier articles as one might wish for.
If not, when were they introduced and by whom? I have to say that I have always found whooping etc. to be one of the more grating and least endearing aspects of most border (and sometimes molly) performances. It seems to me that most, if not all, collected dances have an innate dignity, the "traditional" border dances being no exception.
There is something undignified about whooping and hollering: I can never bring myself to do it, but that may be more to do with my own innate pomposity, of course.
Steve Tunnicliff
Steve Tunnicliff wrote:
re whooping, hollering and falsetto girly screeches. We've probably been here before but as a matter of interest, is there any evidence for these in the records of collected/recorded border dances?
None that I know of, and I've been through the entire Morris Ring Border archives (more than once). In fact, I have a copy of them.
I don't have it in front of me, but I have no recollection of any mention of such utterances in Jones' book which I take to be as authoritative in the matter and as complete a synthesis of the earlier articles as one might wish for.
Again, there is none that I know of, and Jones' booklet is probably the best easily available source for most dancers. The Ring archives are, of course, the "ultimate" - they contain Jones' original notes as well as C#'s, ancient press clippings and some real old stuff written in what is probably middle English. (I'm not an expert on old English language, so please correct me if I'm wrong.)
If not, when were they introduced and by whom?
I would say John KirkPatrick and the Shropshire Bedlams are responsible for this. JK put a strong personal stamp on the Bedlams style.
Vancouver MM have just had a new man join who danced with the Bedlams for 20 years, and was there virtually at the beginning. He is providing us with a lot of insight into the Bedlams and their dances. (Any Bedlams on this list? Don't worry - your secrets are safe!) Of course, he now has to re-learn his Border to do it (what we in Vancouver call) the "Jones' way", now probably evolved into the "Vancouver way".
I have to say that I have always found whooping etc. to be one of the more grating and least endearing aspects of most border (and sometimes molly) performances. It seems to me that most, if not all, collected dances have an innate dignity, the "traditional" border dances being no exception.
I don't know of any evidence supporting the claim that "innate dignity" was one of the features of traditional Welsh Border.
There is something undignified about whooping and hollering: I can never bring myself to do it, but that may be more to do with my own innate pomposity, of course.
The whooping and hollering has always struck me as very artificial - too theatrical. I prefer my Welsh Border to be more natural. IMHO, the dance can still be "basic" and "raw" without resorting to such artificiality.
Having said this, it must be said that the Bedlams put on a great show.
Graham Baldwin
Steve Tunnicliff replies re whooping, hollering and falsetto girly screeches:-
It seems to me that most, if not all, collected dances have an innate dignity, the "traditional" border dances being no exception. There is something undignified about whooping and hollering: I can never bring myself to do it, but that may be more to do with my own innate pomposity, of course.
Phew! that was a close thing, I thought somebody was about to say that it was traditional. I guess it must be a pagan thing then?
Alan Barber
I think I may have the answer. I enquired about this at a Shropshire Bedlam weekend a couple of years ago. I think they started the "tradition" but they can not think why others have imitated them.
In Bishops Castle there have been many generations of a ?gypsy? family, many of whom were musical (and who John and others collected some tunes from). One member is known as Dummy Jones (I think the surname is correct) as he is literally dumb, and can only make shrieking noises to communicate (we saw him walking up the High Street and that part is certainly true). He frequently went to watch the Bedlams, and during dances got excited & screeched his approval. The team started imitating this, and thus the tradition. So all the other imitators of the Shropshire Bedlams are imitating a vocally-challenged gypsy.
Mark Rogers
"Traditional" border may have been quite dignified, I suppose -- hard to tell at this remove, though the kit if nothing else suggests to me otherwise. (Kit as described in the research cited by Jones, I hasten to add -- not modern border kit.)
To me the central problem of "traditional" border morris is this: the dances (mostly) are simple. Too simple! One possibility is that the dances as collected don't accurately reflect the dances as done; but tough, the collected descriptions are what we have to go by.
In a world without car radios, MTV, and satellite TV such simple entertainment may have been good enough, but those days are gone. How, then, can border morris be made to "work" in modern times?
One solution is to embed the dances within a larger context -- that, as I understand it, is what Norman's been on about all these years. I remain skeptical, since the stuff between the audience's ears is not available for us to easily change, and *that* is the important element of the context. A second solution is to discard the collected dances and create new, more choreographically interesting ones. Lots of teams (the Shropshire Bedlams for one) have had lots of success with this approach. A third solution, one which intrigues me, is to take the simplicity of the choreography as a cue to examine all the elements that go into a dance performance, and find ways to make the non-choreographic elements sustain the interest in a simple dance.
In other words, rather than a dull performance of a spectacular dance, aim for a spectacular performance of a dull dance.
One can, of course, combine these approaches. The Bedlams seem capable of spectacular performances of spectacular dances. It's a worthy goal to aim at.
Meanwhile, we do the falsetto girly screeching. It gives the audience something more interesting than the choreography to pay attention to. There's more to making the non-choreographic elements of a performance sustain the interest than that, of course, but it's a start.
Rich Holmes