[Ansteorra] iso european dancers ??

[Charlene Charette]

On Tue, Feb 14, 2012 at 4:27 PM, Randy Shipp <randyshipp at gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm all in favor of reconstructing period art where we're able to do
> so, but when the evidence begins to thin out I think there's some
> benefit to being a bit more speculative.  As long as we're willing to
> be shown later that our "best guess" is contradicted by some new
> research, I don't see any harm in that.  It seems better than just
> willfully doing ahistorical stuff or, even worse, doing stuff that
> isn't fun (like the repetition you mentioned).

There are definitely people pushing the bounds of reconstruction. And
there are differences of opinion as to whether or not this is a good
thing. I don't mind experimentation, but it tends to get codified. You
end up with "I don't care if further research has shown this to be
inaccurate, I like the old way we do it."

> As for your last sentence, absolutely!  I think it's a GREAT idea for
> musicians who have a solid grounding in a particular musical tradition
> to compose their own pieces in that style.  That seems like the very
> essence of this kind of "participatory research" or whatever you want
> to call it.  Another person might study period rolls of arms and
> heraldic style and then create their own barony's roll of arms in a
> period style.  Neither is a copy of a period example, but both are
> fine for teaching ourselves and others something about what was
> actually done in period.

Again, there are people creating dances in a period style. One of my
pet peeves is there isn't a good way for new choreographers to try out
their works in progress. Once (usually casual) dancers learn something
and like it, they're reluctant to change. Also, it can be a challenge
to find a group of dancers willing to be guinea pigs and dance the
same choreographer over and over with tweaks and changes. So a lot of
dances get out in the wild before they're ready for prime time.

--Perronnelle