{"items": [{"author": "Michael", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621185462232", "anchor": "fb-621185462232", "service": "fb", "text": "I like the figure you're working on, but am not sure your history is correct. I remember contra corners as having been a rare figure in the early 80s, not a heck of a lot more common than it is now, perhaps \u2022less\u2022 so.", "timestamp": "1374553906"}, {"author": "Jeannine", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621186460232", "anchor": "fb-621186460232", "service": "fb", "text": "I would love to help you test out this dance!", "timestamp": "1374554356"}, {"author": "Ruthan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621187582982", "anchor": "fb-621187582982", "service": "fb", "text": "Are grid contras a Thing??!?", "timestamp": "1374555539"}, {"author": "Jordy", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621188960222", "anchor": "fb-621188960222", "service": "fb", "text": "I want more contra cornerrrrrrrssssssss", "timestamp": "1374556476"}, {"author": "Jordy", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621188985172", "anchor": "fb-621188985172", "service": "fb", "text": "They've done them all of once in my 5 years here.", "timestamp": "1374556503"}, {"author": "Yoyo", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/112374925965540306459", "anchor": "gp-1374566321491", "service": "gp", "text": "Some dances work well for adapting this way. In Kathy Anderson's Labor of Love, if you're inactive and you balance and box the gnat and turn contra corners with your shadow in the other set, your corners are still your original corners, none the wiser.", "timestamp": 1374566321}, {"author": "Rick", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621196400312", "anchor": "fb-621196400312", "service": "fb", "text": "I love your animated diagram Jeff!", "timestamp": "1374570773"}, {"author": "Lucinda", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621199084932", "anchor": "fb-621199084932", "service": "fb", "text": "I love contra corners, too. I even enjoy my role as non-active, because I get to have the fun of hurling (ok, enthusiastically facilitating the movement into the middle) the active dancer so that they can use that momentum into a turn with their partner. I love that.", "timestamp": "1374577626"}, {"author": "Dottie", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621199668762", "anchor": "fb-621199668762", "service": "fb", "text": "ok, hurling. Cheers!", "timestamp": "1374578487"}, {"author": "Lucinda", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621199813472", "anchor": "fb-621199813472", "service": "fb", "text": "There is at least one dance (the name of which I don't remember - Bob? Rick? Donna? - someone will know) that alternates between 1s and 2s taking the active turning role in contra corners. The thing I love about that dance is that once the caller leaves it up to the dancers to remember whose turn it is to be active, you get the delicious opportunity to make inquiring eye contact with your partner to try to determine which role is yours to play. It's so fun to find the non-verbal way that works as communication. I always come out of that feeling a stronger bond with my partner.", "timestamp": "1374578736"}, {"author": "Sarah", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621200247602", "anchor": "fb-621200247602", "service": "fb", "text": "That's Jim Kitch's \"Alternating Contra Corners\". I love that dance for the same reason!", "timestamp": "1374579404"}, {"author": "Bronwyn", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621200387322", "anchor": "fb-621200387322", "service": "fb", "text": "Neat idea. I suspect it would be hard to execute except when there were very very few beginners in the room. I don't think contra corners is as hard as people make it out to be, but mostly because the 2s are there to make sure everyone gets where they need to be. This variant has no reference points at all. I look forward to trying it at camp sometime though!", "timestamp": "1374579608"}, {"author": "Jonathan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621210951152", "anchor": "fb-621210951152", "service": "fb", "text": "I Love the alternating contra corners dance! I remember the first time I did it I was thinking why did it take so long for someone to write a dance like this :)", "timestamp": "1374589216"}, {"author": "Ralph", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621213346352", "anchor": "fb-621213346352", "service": "fb", "text": "Maybe because we tend to have a number of new dancers at every dance, I find that the \"inactives\" hold the dance together: waving to the \"actives\" to come to me and sending them away in the proper direction. There's nothing boring about it.", "timestamp": "1374589952"}, {"author": "Don", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621215192652", "anchor": "fb-621215192652", "service": "fb", "text": "I am also a fan of Contra Corners - whether it's the wonderful chestnut or any of the variations. It's a great chance for the caller to bring up some dance history and to remember the roots of the dances. Also, Ralph pretty much nailed it as a reason to call it for newcomers.", "timestamp": "1374591408"}, {"author": "Laura", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621217393242", "anchor": "fb-621217393242", "service": "fb", "text": "NOOOO!!!! I'm perfectly willing to wait my turn as twos for the chance to whip around like a crazy person as a 1. Why do we all have to do everything equally all the time?? Bo-RING!!", "timestamp": "1374592726"}, {"author": "Angela", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621233715532", "anchor": "fb-621233715532", "service": "fb", "text": "(Lucinda, Sarah, and Johnathan: Almost all contra corners dances can have the 1's and 2's alternate. What's important is that, at the end up the figure, when 1's were to face up, 2's should be instructed to face down. Jeff, I think you were there when I called Tom Hind's \"The Tease\" with alternating corners at the Groove earlier this summer.)

Super-interesting concept, but you really would need an all-star team to get something like thing functioning on a dance floor...I agree that having no fixed points of reference would be extremely challenging for even very experienced dancers.

I would like to see a version of your animation where the sets are colored differently, if possible! :)", "timestamp": "1374604153"}, {"author": "Phillip", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621235107742", "anchor": "fb-621235107742", "service": "fb", "text": "1) I do remember contra corners as being more popular, usually but not always once a night (more in Cambridge Thursday than the concord dances) 2) I dislike the balanced contra corners in that they are a bit more confusing because 3) I agree with Laura DeCesare that the two role is just as fun with the right attitude (the big part of the two role is to flirt with your partner across the set or to cheater swing with someone in another set.", "timestamp": "1374604511"}, {"author": "Phillip", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621235571812", "anchor": "fb-621235571812", "service": "fb", "text": "Jeff Kaufman your gif is too busy for me to grok, at some point I will look at the description to see if I can visualize, but my gut says this is a first Friday move.", "timestamp": "1374604596"}, {"author": "Ron", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621265352132", "anchor": "fb-621265352132", "service": "fb", "text": "Soo ... I've been waiting for a dance to call \"California Corners\". I'm hoping in September.", "timestamp": "1374619275"}, {"author": "Robert", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621343869782", "anchor": "fb-621343869782", "service": "fb", "text": "OK, Google was no help to me in finding a dance called \"California Corners\", and I'm wondering if it's the one Linda called in Jamaica Plain earlier this year in which the 1s turn all four of the possible corner people.", "timestamp": "1374681001"}, {"author": "Angela", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621344593332", "anchor": "fb-621344593332", "service": "fb", "text": "Ron, isn't California Corners that one you were writing?", "timestamp": "1374681418"}, {"author": "Ron", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621344957602", "anchor": "fb-621344957602", "service": "fb", "text": "Robert, you haven't found it because I haven't published it yet. I haven't published it because it's been tested but not danced. :)", "timestamp": "1374681650"}, {"author": "Robert", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621345047422", "anchor": "fb-621345047422", "service": "fb", "text": "Ah, so it's clearly not the one I was thinking of. :-)", "timestamp": "1374681728"}, {"author": "Linda", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621369473472", "anchor": "fb-621369473472", "service": "fb", "text": "Here is the dance I called in Jamaica Plain in March.", "timestamp": "1374698415"}, {"author": "Linda", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621369693032", "anchor": "fb-621369693032", "service": "fb", "text": "Sorry, pressed the dang return button too soon....Double Trouble
Peter Foster
Type: Contra
Formation: Duple-Improper
Level: Adv
Music: Ask the band for very distinct As & Bs.

A1 (ones between twos) Mirror allemande once and a half
Twos Half Figure eight down the set
A2 Twos double contra corners*
B1 Finish the double contra corners
B2 twos B & S (face up)
C1 twos between ones mirror allemande 1 & 1/2
Ones Half Figure eight up the set
C2 double contra corners
D1 Finish the corners
D2 Ones B & S
*Notes from the author *1st corner is opp-role, across & right
\t\u2022\t2nd corner is opp-role, across & left
\t\u2022\t3rd corner is same-role, immediate left
\t\u2022\t4th corner is same-role, immediate right
Each time, the active couple turns partner by the right 3/4, then corner by left once around
**Remind folks that whichever couple is swinging will be in the MIDDLE for the handy hand turn.
There is LOTS of time for doing all the corners! Dancers should not rush.", "timestamp": "1374698544"}, {"author": "Robert", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621380296782", "anchor": "fb-621380296782", "service": "fb", "text": "Thanks, Linda. My recollection suggests that it's well-named. :-) (Really cool dance, actually.)", "timestamp": "1374705379"}, {"author": "Linda", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/621183720722?comment_id=621384952452", "anchor": "fb-621384952452", "service": "fb", "text": "Glad to help! And also happy to hear that you enjoyed it.", "timestamp": "1374709290"}, {"author": "Lex", "source_link": "https://plus.google.com/111102660583646544610", "anchor": "gp-1375226916412", "service": "gp", "text": "That sounds really fun!\n
\n
\nI will say that contra corners challenges the groups I dance in in Atlanta, so that's an additional reason callers are probably reticent about calling it. \u00a0The active/inactive division is probably also part of it. I'll ask around.", "timestamp": 1375226916}]}