Clogging

January 24th, 2012
clogging, contra
Listen at a contra dance and you'll hear people clogging, making noise with their feet. It's now mostly limited to balances and long lines, but you'll see people do it when they're 'inactive' during an older dance like Chorus Jig. Back when most dances had 'actives' and 'inactives' there was a lot more of that. Most clogging now is teams that do southern clogging or modern competition clogging with synchronized stepping routines. This does make it better to watch, but I like it as a component of social dance, not performance. If you go to a lot of contra dances on good wooden floors wearing shoes that make noise, you'll pick it up the old way as part of the dancing. [1]


[1] This is how I learned it. If you're curious you can see me clogging some while calling at Northboro or by myself. I also did some while dancing with the the Points of Etiquette longsword side, enough to learn that I don't enjoy routines.

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