Denver, Day 3

Today was the first day of caller school. rlegters and kent4str had to be there by 9 AM although technically tdjohnsn and I could have slept in until, oh, 2009. Ah, well... as dutiful husbands, we arose with the others and headed to the Grand Hyatt.

rlegters and tdjohnsn were in the intermediate hall with caller coaches Barry Clasper and Deborah Carroll-Jones; kent4str and I made ourselves comfortable in the advanced hall with John Marshall and justetthon.

Classmates in the advanced hall included JP Slater, Chris Phelan, Dave Decot, otterpop58, sfleatherbear, fuzzygruf and krisjensen. I passed billeyler in the hallway a couple of times, abqdan at least once and canseefour popped by a couple of times to check on our progress. LJ was indeed well represented. :-)

The advanced session started largely the way I'm sure all of the other halls did: introductions of the attendees, descriptions of their work to date, questions about what they'd like to get out of this particular course, etc.. Each student caller then called a brief patter and singer segment just to give John and justetthon a baseline from which to work.

In the next round, there was work done on sight resolution, including our coaches arranging the dancers into deliciously obtuse formations for the student to normalize and resolve.

After lunch at a nearby food court, we were all back again for a discussion on difficult choreography (with truly painful examples), then a session on creative choreo with some cleverly facilitated group work.

I was not registered for this caller school. I have too much running through my mind concerning the IAGSDC delegates meeting, the Gay Callers Assocation (GCA) membership meeting, the Denver convention as a whole and all matters relating to the 2009 convention in DC: the stress of being required to dedicate 20+ hours in three days to caller school along with my normal performance anxiety is simply more than I want to deal with currently.

If caller school and the convention were separated by a week instead of a few hours, I'd probably be able to manage it all. An early life lesson: pick your battles carefully. Alas, 2008 and 2009 are going to be even worse although at least my term on the GCA board will conclude this Thursday, relieving me of some stress. I can't believe I actually considered running for GCA vice-president last year... I must have been momentarily insane.

In any case, auditing the class and volunteering as a checker is doable for me since I can leave at any time if business matters require my attention elsewhere, and I still get to observe and absorb the wisdom --and there was indeed much wisdom and experience being shared-- so I'm still ultimately a better caller despite my limited mental resources.

For example, today's take-away on what makes choreography difficult:

• dancers needing to pause to re-evaluate their position/formation;
  
• reversing body flow;
  
• unexpected or unusual calls;
  
• non-standard starting positions;
  
• density/stacking of calls, especially with inexperienced dancers;
  
• speed and style of the music;
  
• clipped timing of the calls;
  
• inappropriate or badly timed cuing;
  
• environmental factors (eg. circular room, pillars, outdoors);
  
• novice dancers
  
• dancer expectations and/or anticipation from habit & training.
  

Memorable quotes:
John Marshall, referring to square breathing, the automatic adjustment dancers make to expanding or shrinking a square in either axis to make space for some calls: "There's breathing and then there's gasping."

Deborah Carroll-Jones, urging an intermediate caller to use 'ferris wheel' for a resolution set-up: "C'mon, use the f-word!"

Denver, Day 3

Today was the first day of caller school. rlegters and kent4str had to be there by 9 AM although technically tdjohnsn and I could have slept in until, oh, 2009. Ah, well... as dutiful husbands, we arose with the others and headed to the Grand Hyatt.

rlegters and tdjohnsn were in the intermediate hall with caller coaches Barry Clasper and Deborah Carroll-Jones; kent4str and I made ourselves comfortable in the advanced hall with John Marshall and justetthon.

Classmates in the advanced hall included JP Slater, Chris Phelan, Dave Decot, otterpop58, sfleatherbear, fuzzygruf and krisjensen. I passed billeyler in the hallway a couple of times, abqdan at least once and canseefour popped by a couple of times to check on our progress. LJ was indeed well represented. :-)

The advanced session started largely the way I'm sure all of the other halls did: introductions of the attendees, descriptions of their work to date, questions about what they'd like to get out of this particular course, etc.. Each student caller then called a brief patter and singer segment just to give John and justetthon a baseline from which to work.

In the next round, there was work done on sight resolution, including our coaches arranging the dancers into deliciously obtuse formations for the student to normalize and resolve.

After lunch at a nearby food court, we were all back again for a discussion on difficult choreography (with truly painful examples), then a session on creative choreo with some cleverly facilitated group work.

I was not registered for this caller school. I have too much running through my mind concerning the IAGSDC delegates meeting, the Gay Callers Assocation (GCA) membership meeting, the Denver convention as a whole and all matters relating to the 2009 convention in DC: the stress of being required to dedicate 20+ hours in three days to caller school along with my normal performance anxiety is simply more than I want to deal with currently.

If caller school and the convention were separated by a week instead of a few hours, I'd probably be able to manage it all. An early life lesson: pick your battles carefully. Alas, 2008 and 2009 are going to be even worse although at least my term on the GCA board will conclude this Thursday, relieving me of some stress. I can't believe I actually considered running for GCA vice-president last year... I must have been momentarily insane.

In any case, auditing the class and volunteering as a checker is doable for me since I can leave at any time if business matters require my attention elsewhere, and I still get to observe and absorb the wisdom --and there was indeed much wisdom and experience being shared-- so I'm still ultimately a better caller despite my limited mental resources.

For example, today's take-away on what makes choreography difficult:

• dancers needing to pause to re-evaluate their position/formation;
  
• reversing body flow;
  
• unexpected or unusual calls;
  
• non-standard starting positions;
  
• density/stacking of calls, especially with inexperienced dancers;
  
• speed and style of the music;
  
• clipped timing of the calls;
  
• inappropriate or badly timed cuing;
  
• environmental factors (eg. circular room, pillars, outdoors);
  
• novice dancers
  
• dancer expectations and/or anticipation from habit & training.
  

Memorable quotes:
John Marshall, referring to square breathing, the automatic adjustment dancers make to expanding or shrinking a square in either axis to make space for some calls: "There's breathing and then there's gasping."

Deborah Carroll-Jones, urging an intermediate caller to use 'ferris wheel' for a resolution set-up: "C'mon, use the f-word!"