Hi,
Sorry to be so late with this response.  Here are two suggestions, both set
dances: Double Dot - for 5 people, and Pride of the Dingle for 9 people. I
do not have authors.  I think "Pride" is traditional. (Dingle is a peninsula
in Ireland.)
Rickey Holt,
Fremont, NH
DOUBLE DOT
>From the calling of Marianne Taylor, from whom I learned the dance.
Formation: 4 people on the ends of a plus sign with the fifth person in the
middle facing up (or if it easier to picture, 4 people on the sides of a
square as if each was missing a partner, plus that fifth in the middle).
Left and Right are from the perspective of the middle person - who is facing
up
A1	Middle person, top and right hand person - Star Right
	Into a Star Left for middle, bottom and left hand person
A2	Hey for 3 up and down the middle - for middle, top and bottom;
middle 	and top, right shoulders to start
B1,2	Middle and RIGHT hand person balance together and away and change
places (i.e. allemande right 1/2 way)
	Repeat for NEW middle and bottom
	Repeat for new middle and next 
	Repeat for new middle and current top.  Do not let go of this last
change and form the star to start the dance again.
I like to use waltzes, Marianne used Reels
PRIDE OF THE DINGLE
Formation: Four couples in longways formation, proper, men on caller's
right, women across from them, AND an extra person at the bottom, between
and below the lines, facing up.
A1	All dance down the hall single file while the Dingle dances up
between 	the lines
	Turn and dance back
A2	"Climb the Ladder": On the sides, all Allemande Left 1/2, then Right
1/2.  Dingle joins each allemande to make a 3 person star in 	succession
moving up with each successive star.  This is repeated (for 	a total of
twice) until the dingle is at the top.  
B1	Dingle joins line of their own gender (if this can be determined).
Lines go forward and back, with the dingle going forward to an empty
spot.
	All go forward and back again but adjust so that the all are
opposite a new partner.  This means that the dingle's line moves down 	one
place as it moves forward and a new dingle is popped out at the
bottom.
B2	All swing new partners.  Optionally, Dingle can join the bottom
couple 	to form a basket of three (although I normally do this dance for
beginners and they are too busy getting straight to do the basket).


-----Original Message-----
From: callers-bounces at sharedweight.net
[mailto:callers-bounces at sharedweight.net] On Behalf Of Will Loving
Sent: Tuesday, October 14, 2008 9:56 AM
To: Callers at sharedweight.net
Subject: [Callers] Dances for 3-6 couples

As a new caller, I¹m looking for advise and/or suggestions for events with a
very small number of dancers, 3-6 couples. At a dance I called in August
(granted a slow month) we had at most five couples and that was if I and a
couple of people who came to play music danced. I threw away my carefully
planned program and wound up doing a number of triplets (thank you David
Smukler) and a four-on-four that I modified so that it stayed together as a
set and resulted in a change of partners each time through. It was a little
clunky but it mostly worked and gave us some variety.

I am of course trying to avoid the scenario of people spending half the
dance as neutrals when there only four couples in a set, and I¹m not really
ready to take on learning some squares in the next few days which would be
the obvious choice. I am hopeful that there will be more people this time,
but in case I¹m in the same situation again, I¹m studying more triplets, a
couple of dbl-progression dances for 4+ couple sets (so that no one waits
out at the end for long) and looking for other ideas.

Levi Jackson Rag is a possibility, but I¹d still like to have some other
options in my pocket. It did occur to me to suggest an extra couples dance
or two just to break things up if we¹re doing lots of short dances with 3-5
couples.

Thanks,

Will Loving
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