Contra Callers

This mailing list welcomes contra dance callers and people who are interested in learning about calling for contra dances.

Our goal is to support each other by:

• Asking and answering questions that are of interest to contra dance callers.
• Discussing issues that come up as callers.
• Sharing resources that are helpful in calling for contra dances
• Plan and announce caller gatherings and learning opportunities.

We discuss a wide variety of topics – the following are just a few examples to give you a taste!

• Sharing individual dances and asking for help identifying dances.
• How to effectively teach certain dance figures.
• Calling for different audiences (e.g., visually impared; a room full of brand new dancers)
• Sharing new resources that come out for callers (e.g., websites; books; etc)

New callers are especially encouraged to send questions to the group and learn from those with more experience -> we all started as beginners and even experienced callers have lots to learn!

Special Note: This list welcomes occasional discussion relating to other dance traditions.  However, Shared weight has two other lists that you might be interested in as a caller.

• The tradcallers list focuses on traditional squares, community/barn dances and other trad dance forms outside the contra dance and ECD realm. (This includes teaching in schools and other settings with youth.) 
• The ECD list includes conversation about calling for English Country Dance.

– Seth Seeger & Chris Weiler, list founders

From Seth Seeger & Chris Weiler (list founders): After a wonderful callers workshop at CDSS’s Pinewoods American Week in 2004,  we decided that we wanted to try to keep the class going on in some way. We hoped that we could still draw on the support from Tom Hinds and the other experienced callers as well as their knowledge. To that end, we created the callers e-mail discussion group to discuss contra and traditional square dance calling. 

The list moderators (managers) are: Chris Weiler and Seth Seeger.

The current list champions are Louise Siddons, Jack Mitchell, Lisa Greenleaf, and Diane Silver.

List champions actively support the list by promoting its existence and encouraging conversation. If you would like to become a list champion, reach out to Chris and Seth.

You can subscribe to the contra callers list in one of two ways:

1. Signing up for a Shared Weight account prior to subscribing.
2. Subscribing without creating an account.

Creating an account takes a few more steps but they are quick and having an account has definite advantages. This includes that you can manage your Shared Weight messages (e.g., sign up to receive the digest version – helpful if you want to limit the number of emails in your inbox)

Follow these steps to subscribe with an account:

1. Visit https://lists.sharedweight.net/postorius/lists/ 
2. Click ‘Sign Up’ in the top right corner. Then follow the instructions to create an account. Note –> your username can’t have a space.
3. Check your email inbox and follow the instructions in the confirmation email. This will lead you to the login page.
4. Once you are logged in, click on the list you want to join and then click  ‘Subscribe’. 
   Note -> You can use the same account to subscribe to more than one list!
   Add your email address. We highly recommend that you also add your name – the Shared Weight lists are a supportive community and it’s good for folks to know who you are! 
5. Click subscribe.
6. One you have a Shared Weight account and have subscribed to the list(s), you can manage your settings.  Check out our technical FAQ page.

The contra callers archive is public.

You can view past posts by visiting this link.

FAQs specific to the contra caller list are coming soon.

In the meantime, if you have technical questions about how the list works, please check out the technical FAQ page.  If you still haven’t found the answer to your question, email the list moderators –  Chris Weiler and Seth Seeger.