October 2001
We are now deep into our 25th
year and have enjoyed many celebrations.
Hopefully you have been to and survived these special events. I also
hope that you are revved up to the final big event of the year. The arrival of
Tineke van Geel for her Armenian workshops over the week-end 27 – 28
October. An event not to be
missed. Hope to see you there!
Tineke will be visiting Canberra and Sydney
before flying to Perth, so hopefully she will be relaxed, over any jet-lag and
in a good Aussie frame of mind when she arrives in Perth. She has not visited
Australia before so come and say ‘hello’ and help her over any culture shock.
Generally I feel that our Jubilee year
celebrations have gone well. Following
on from our ‘old dances revisited’ theme earlier in the year the Monday night
teaching has also focussed on some older dances with Saeynu, Hora de la
Adunati, and Floricica being taught by Eve in the last couple of months.
In this issue we focus on some traveller’s
tales. From Gisela Gmeinder who chased the Victorian snow in the winter, from
Laurel de Vietri, who sent us another dispatch from France, and from Palenque
Blair who attended the Yves Moreau workshops and later attended a Folk Dance
Teacher training workshop in Canberra. On behalf of the Group I would like to thank Palenque for her effort here,
even if it may mean that we get more exercise as a result of the more focused
teaching!!
Talking of travellers we heard from Pam
Massey recently. She emailed us from
the Cook Islands in the Pacific. We had
been getting long updates on her travels headed Chapter 1, Chapter 2 etc. Apparently Chapter 3 got lost in the ether
and her last email was a sorry ten-liner talking of paradise! We missed out on
some good reading but really holidays should be about enjoying yourself not
being hunched over a keyboard!
Martin Williams - President
The
Folk Dance Australia – Folkdance Teacher Training Course - by Palenque Blair
Having
been in Canberra exactly one month earlier at the Yves Moreau workshops, I
headed off to Canberra again in July for a seven day teacher training course
that was supposed to make me a brilliant and confidant teacher of International
Folkdance! The course was originally
modelled on the design of a similar course taught in Holland to invited participants,
who train for two years on a part-time basis.
The demand being less in Australia, the course is open to all who care
to participate (and can take the time and money to get to Canberra!). On arrival in misty, overcast Canberra –
which it stayed all week – my hosts Michaela and Michael very kindly met me at
the airport. I had one day free – in
which I saw some of the National Park surrounding Canberra and walked along
muddy tracks in Eucalypt woodland with smatterings of snow. The animal prints in the several-day-old
fallen snow were the most exotic! We
even managed to take a snowball home on the windscreen for Michaela’s kids
Edward and Harriet.
Next
day the course began. I met the
participants: Mary, tango dancer Suzanne and Michaela (all from Canberra),
Krista from Hobart, Jeanette and Fiona from New South Wales. Also present was Fiona’s husband Paul and of
course the teachers. Course coordinator
was Lesley Rose – a Canberra resident, and member of Folk Dance Canberra and
Folk Dance Australia. She was supported
by Christine and Jim Battison – a long-serving folkdance couple and founders of
Folk Dance Canberra. Christine had run
previous teacher training courses since the reins had been handed over from
André Van de Plas, but her main role for our course was to organise morning and
afternoon tea everyday. Christine and
Lesley had both recently returned from Romania and Holland where they had
participated in dance workshops, experienced ethnic cultures and learnt many
dances. During the week we heard much
about the experience – including watching some video and photos at an evening
at Christine’s house.
The
course itself involved dancing every day, and theory (approximately half and
half I guess). Specialist teachers were
brought in for many of the lessons – including music theory, theory of
learning, lesson preparation etc. Dance
and music analysis were taught by Jim Battison whose career was electrical
systems analysis and hobby dance analysis and notation, particularly using a
notation system known as Romanotation (and not surprisingly sourced from
Romania and particularly adapted for notating Romanian dances!). We enjoyed ourselves, and the collection of
challenging dances presented to us, although confidence and smiles certainly
melted when the video recorder came out.
Each
of the students was given the opportunity to teach to a group of 15-30 Folk
Dance Canberra “Guinea Pigs” twice during the week. The group being generally on the over 50 side, we all learnt the
simple dances taught by each student teacher.
The most challenging dance to my mind being a Bulgarian dance taught
with a latin hip swing and rhythm, although probably most challenging for the
“guinea pigs” was the “Basic 8 Tango”.
One innovation that was new to me involved a couple of easy dances
taught by Krista (of Finnish extraction I believe, or was it Norwegian?) that
she had created herself. One called
“Kiss of the Ancients” had an environmental story to it and was apparently
created for performance at a protest event!
Mid-week,
to increase my folkdance experience in Canberra, Michaela, Edward, Mary and I
went to the Canberra International Folk Dance Association (CIFDA) dance
evening. The group was very small, but
friendly, with several grand-kids along with the attendees, it being school
holidays. (Oh, and it cost $8!). The group organised itself by a formal
roster for members as teachers, DJ, tea and supper organiser and hall-openers,
which didn’t leave more than that many again to relax! I do think that PIFDG has got the best
Folkdance group in the country, although maybe FDC’s hall has something to be
said for its size and airconditioning!
Well,
apart from major doses of colds going around the group (of which I was
unfortunately the first and hardest-hit casualty, coming down with it after one
day in Canberra! – so much for holiday leave!). The symptoms were partly soothed by Paul’s efforts consisting of
plying me with endless lemon-honey drinks – which I greatly appreciated. An interesting and not always appreciated
aspect of Paul’s presence, is that he became the handyman for the week, and
spent at least half the week up ladders around the room, repainting the hall
(phooee!). I’m not quite sure what was
wrong with the original colour, although it certainly wasn’t as bright as our
kindy-themed hall.
The
week ended with a party on the Saturday night when Mary’s husband Nick brought
his band who were practicing their Macedonian music (their favourite!). We did a lot of dancing, including several
of those taught by students during the week and half a dozen to live
music. I lead An Dro to the band’s
music. More biscuits and cakes later
and the group thinned out. Finally Jim
Battison (always dancing in his opanke shoes) put on as many energetic (and
mostly unknown Balkan) dances as he could think of to try and wear me out –
which really it didn’t take much, particularly as I had a lovely 6am flight to
catch to Melbourne the next morning!
Tony,
Laurel, Gabrielle and Raphaël have recently returned from dancing festivals and
workshops in France. Tony’s favourite workshops seemed to be the Minuet and
Mazurka ones and Laurel branched out a bit from the French workshops to do some
dancing from Catalonia. However, the French dance workshops had a strong pull
and she could not resist the Breton workshops and balls. She and Gabrielle
learnt an ‘Avant deux’ or two from Poitou and some dances of Béarn and other
Gascogne regions. Raphaël some fancy waltz workshops and helped out with the
zydeco workshops. They all met up with Yves Paliern who camped right beside
them and exchanged notes about Perth International Folk Dance Group. Yves
seemed to be camping with a large group of women!
At
the St Chartier festival in Berry
everyone sat in the rain and cold to see incredible concerts that were well
worth the discomfort - Italian music, Celtic bands and many a hurdy-gurdy and
cornemuse player on stage. Tony walked for kilometres every day and enjoyed the
French countryside while Laurel, Gabrielle and Raphaël spent too many late
nights at the ‘bals folk’ to be interested in such things. Raph’s average
bedtime was 4am!
At
the Grand Bal de L’Europe festival
held on a farm near Gennetines the cows seemed to have no concern about
catching La Vache Folle (mad cow
disease) or La Fievre Aphteuse (foot
and mouth), nor did the ‘festivaliers’ who ate the local beef each day. The
rain continued but the festive spirit could not be dampened and the
entertainment was superb with amazing German, Slovakian, Irish , French and
other performances, The workshops were,
as usual, of the highest quality as far as teaching was concerned and each
attracted hundreds of participants, with 12 workshops going at once.
For
Laurel and Raphaël, the week long course of bourrée in the Auvergne called Les Volcaniques conducted by ‘Les
Brayauds’ was the most rewarding. Raphaël was able to play with the band
members and his accordion playing was given a great boost. All the well known
French folk musicians gathered there to play for concerts and balls which were
held each night and they mingled with the dancers along with children who were
also learning to play and dance. The children taught Raphaël some French songs,
the words of which are a well kept secret from mum!
The completion of a work contract and the
looming threat of loosing frequent flyer points due to their expiry led to a
couple of weeks “over east” recently.
In addition, after many years of living in WA, I finally wanted to see
the “Australian Alps” and “Australian Snow”since I was fairly familiar with the
Austrian variety. And indeeed there was plenty of it to be found in the
Perisher Blue/Guthega (NSW) and Mt. Hotham/Falls Creek (Vic) where I quickly
got over the strange look of snowgums (instead of fir/pinetrees) and enjoyed 3
days to their full lengths on skis. It left me wanting more but that had to be
enough for this season.
Passing through Melbourne/Canberra/Sydney
gave me an opportunity to visit a Folk dance Group in each place.
The Melbourne Group met in the Suburb of
Box Hill in a very small building, used for teaching ballet and other dance
forms, situated on a wide median strip of a highway – and unfortunately often
being mistaken for conveniences from a distance by passers by! The female group was small and friendly,
mainly drawing from a repertoire of dances from André’s workshops.
Next was Canberra where Michaela Hill
introduced me to the Monday class not far from her house (nothing is really
very far in Canberra – especially in comparison to Melbourne, or worse, Sydney!!)
The Group was still alive with dances that Yves Moreau had taught just
recently, and again was very welcoming and mixed, with two men participating.
Finally
off to Sydney and there the theme was definitely Bulgarian!! No wonder
considering that the leader Chris Wild and two other participants that night,
Jo and Bridget, had been part of our group tour to Bulgaria with Belcho Stanev
in 1997. Ray and Deirdre Kidd also
joined the group for part of the night.
We all remember their talented poetry and rhyme presented in Bulgaria as
part of our farewell “concert”. They
kindly hosted me while I was in Sydney and they send their regards to our Perth
Group which they visited about this time last year, including a trip to the
local Araluen Folk Festival. Deidre is
very interested in joining a group from Australia (organised by Christine
Battison from Canberra) for a folk seminar in Romania next year. Perhaps this may also attract participants
from Perth!
All
Groups that I visited graciously accepted me as a guest and in this connection
made me feel more at home in all the places.
Yet it was good to be “home” again too and recognising the strength of
numbers and enthusiasm of our own Group in Perth. And yes it is just 15 minutes ‘up the road’ without incurring
bridge tolls, missing the last bus, greedy parking meters and other small
inconveniences.
Thank
you to all the Groups, Michaela, Ray and Deirdre and John Whaite who provided
some initial contacts.
Notice of AGM
The Group's Annual
General Meeting will be held on Monday 26 November at St Margaret's Hall,
starting at 8:30 after teaching.
Members are invited to come along and vote for the 2002 Committee.
Recent Monday Night Teachings
Sylivrianos Syrtos Greece
Chaj Zibede Albania
Varnenski
Predsvatben Bulgaria
Vidinsko Horo Bulgaria
An Dro Retourne Brittany
Saeynu Israel
Hora pe Bataie Romania
Dospatsko Horo Bulgaria
Krki Krici Ticek Croatia
Ijswals Holland
Hora De la Adunatii Romania
Moj Dragane Croatia
Nigun Shel Yossi Israel
Setnja Bulgaria
Horlepiep Hopsa Holland
Gunnega Armenia
Two more photos from our
collection
Pam and Martin Williams after the last Dance Week
performance:
and at the Ethiopian Restaurant after the 25th
party