g r a p e v i n e - perth international danceg r a p e v i n e volume 30 number 1 december 2018...

G R A P E V I N E Volume 30 Number 1 December 2018

Grapevine is the newsletter of Perth International Dance. The Group meets at St Margaret’s Church Hall in Nedlands (Cnr Tyrell& Elizabeth) on Monday evenings and Saturday mornings. Monday evenings begin at 7.15 pm. Saturdays - 10:15 am - 12:15. A1 hour dance lesson is followed by a break for tea & general & request dancing. There is also a Friday session at 9.30 am inGlen Forrest Hall, Statham / Marnie. For more information please call Jennifer (0409372414) or Palenque (0423 834 439)

President's Report 2018Welcome to the end of a busy and eventfulyear. Year 2017 ended with the regulation partytimes and visits by a PID member called SantaClaus. The Monday Night session enjoyed abanquet of food and dancing to our favouriteband, The Last Five Coins. The Saturdaysession similarly enjoyed a banquet of food withfamily, friends and lots of children. No one couldever accuse us of not eating well !!

As always, my thanks and appreciation tocommittee members for their supportthroughout the year. It could be said that 2018was a year of significant events. A lot of effortwent into PID complying with the newAssociations Incorporation Act 2015. This iscovered elsewhere in Grapevine but I wouldlike to specifically thank Martin and John W fortheir hard work.

Perth International Dance conducted aworkshop at this year’s Fairbridge Folk Festival,in conjunction with The Last Five Coins.Coordinated by Eve, Palenque and John W, itwas as always, a well-coordinated, performedand successful occasion.

Our one and only astrophysicist StevenJanowiecki, committee member; musician andcontradance guru, has returned to the USA. Inhis short time with us Steven became asignificant networking part of the local folkmusic fraternity bringing together a host ofmusicians to provide us with live music at theContradance sessions he introduced. PID isnow sponsoring the Contradance sessions. Weshall miss his “provocative” commentaries,corrections and wise counsel on committee andof course his great Contradance calling.

We missed our regular visit from André van derPlas - he was stuck in Bali - only 2828 kmaway!! Thanks to some of our dedicatedteachers who met André at the airport on hisway to Adelaide and learned some of this year'sdances.

Congratulations and many thanks to Leone forher many years of enthusiasm and coordinationof Red Faces. The September edition was a

watershed event for Leone who is steppingdown from the role of co-ordinator of this socialevent. Thanks to Pam Massey who stepped upto coordinate this year’s event. Red faces mayrise again in the future as a social occasion, butnot as a PID event. Wanted - someone withLeone’s enthusiasm!

Congratulations to Jennifer E. for continuing topromote and develop the Hills group. Theirgroup numbers have steadily increased thisyear and their enthusiasm and dancing skillsare certainly up there with the rest of us. I’vesaid it before and I’ll say it again where wouldwe be without our teachers. Have you evernoticed when the music starts and there’s noteacher, how we just kind of standstill orstumble our way through some dances? To ourteachers I say – we need you to stay healthy!

We had some good theme nights this year andthe re-introduction of $5 nights for PH Mondayswas a great success. Thanks to Trish Eyre forher initiative in arranging the short PolishFolkdance Workshop on Monday the 29th

October and for standing in as Secretary whileMartin was on holiday.

Thanks to John W for his tireless support of the'Introduction to Folk Dance'; to Eve, withsupport from Jenny C, in running the 3rd Sundayof the month sessions with more complexfolkloric dances; and to Palenque forcontinuing to promote the Youngsters Dance.

And finally, performance; our performers spendmany precious hours of their personal timerehearsing to make sure they always put on aprofessional performance. Their commitmentand performances are greatly appreciated.

My apologies to anyone missed or to events notacknowledged in my report. Some of the aboveis covered elsewhere in Grapevine.

In closing I offer a pearly wisdom for 2019"There are shortcuts to happiness - dance isone of them." - Baum

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year toone and all

John B ‘The Prez’

http://www.perthinternationaldance.org.au/

Dates for your Diary

Saturday Xmas party 10:00 15th December

Monday Xmas party 7:30 17th December

With the Last Five Coins

Both Christmas Parties are free again thisyear – but please remember to bring a plate.

Teacher programme for early 2019Mondays Saturdays

January Jennifer Jenny C

February Jenny C Laurel

March Eve John

Please confirm on www.perthinternationaldance.org.au

Dancing Restart Dates 2019

Saturday dancing 5th January

Monday dancing 7th January

Friday Hills dancing 1st February

Towards a New ConstitutionAfter a lot of work the dance group is about toget a new constitution. This will replace theoriginal one created way back when - probablyin 1977 - we're not sure as it doesn't have adate on it!!Early in 2016 the Western Australian StateGovernment passed an Act aimed at 'Not forProfit' organisations such as ours; the aimbeing to bring consistency across the morethan 18,000 associations identified in WesternAustralia; consistency in terms of:

The name of the association

The objectives;

Committee and AGM quorums; and

The financial year

A set of Model Rules and various checklistswere provided as part of the Act and thesewere used to format our new document. Martinand John W. did most of the hard work, sothanks to them for that. In the end it wasdecided to make minimal change to the ModelRules which were promoted by the Departmentof Mines as authors of the Act. Various drafts

were reviewed by the Committee along theway. The new constitution is on the PID Web-site.http://www.perthinternationaldance.org.auIt's on the home page just page down and lookfor 'AGM / New Rules'.The document which also incorporates a smallnumber of changes suggested by membersnow needs to be approved at the AGM.We urge you to read the new constitution - at35 pages it does make easier reading than theAct itself which is 164 pages; a great cure forinsomniacs.

News from the Hills2018 has been an interesting year. Our Hillsgroup has had to move a few times while theShire conducted routine maintenance on thelocal halls.

Our latest and hopefully permanent home is inGlen Forrest. We have a good-sized hall, welllit with ample parking and not too bad awooden floor. The hall is a short distance from2 local cafes (very important) and just downthe road from Jenny Currell's, where wecelebrated her 60th birthday after 2 hours ofdancing and also our spring party. We werehappy to welcome a few visitors from theMonday and Saturday groups and were luckythat the sun came out in time for us to enjoylunch in Jenny’s lovely spring garden.

But it’s not all cafés and gardens in the Hills!The group has been working hard to increaseits repertoire, mastering some of our morechallenging dances with great success. Wehave also been busy preparing for aperformance at Yallambee Residential Care inMundaring.

The Hills Group will be celebrating the year-end a little early this year. We will dance at theGlen Forrest Hall from 9.30am on December7th and will lunch at Clare’s home inParkerville afterwards. We look forward toseeing our friends and visitors from ‘afar’, fora laid back celebration of the year that hasbeen. We thank Jenny and Clare for theirhospitality and, as usual, look forward to thecoming year with good friends and gooddancing.

All the best from the Hills

Cheers, Jennifer Eyre

Performance for Turkish Republic DayThe performance at the Turkish Republic Ballat the Perth Westin Hotel on 27th October wentvery well.The event, staged by the Turkish AustralianCulture House (TAHC), was to celebrate the95th anniversary of the creation of the TurkishRepublic.It was a great evening; a superb new hotel,wonderful food, a guest band flown in fromSydney and about 150 attendees. They were avery appreciative audience which really makesa difference when one is performing.

Eve, as performance coordinator, put togethera great selection of dances from differentareas of Turkey. We danced Hopa Horanu,Sallama, Cepikli, Konyali, Kechiko, Çıtçıt andMuhtarin Oglu Ali. Tuna joined us for the lastdance.Our thanks to Tuna Dincer for involving us andcongratulations to her as chairperson of TACHcommittee for organising the event. Well done!

Introduction to International Dance - 2019In January PID will be presenting a 4 week'Introduction to International Dance' Course.Starting on 5th January and ending on 26th -yes Australia Day, the cost is $32 for the fullcourse [$10 casual]. Special deals availablefor 15 - 18 yo, students training to be danceteachers and existing intro sessionattendees!! Tell your friends about it!!

Perth Contra Dance

Now that Steven Janowiecki and Amanda havereturned to the USA PID has taken over thecontradance sessions.

The 3 hour sessions are held each secondSunday of the month from 2pm to 5pm at StMargaret's hall in Nedlands, yes 'our' hall. Thecost is $5 which includes live music. All dancesare called. Great fun and great exercise. Bepart of it!! Sessions restart in February 2019.

Red Faces 2018 - end of an era

Thanks to Bernie McGinn for the photo

The annual Red Faces event was a watershedevent for Leone Pitman who is stepping downfrom the role of co-ordinator. Pam Masseystepped up to coordinate this year’s event.Thanks Pam for a job well done.Congratulations and many thanks to Leone forher many years of enthusiasm andcoordination of this social event. Any memberwith the same enthusiasm as Leone, may wishto continue it into the future as a socialoccasion, but not as a PID event.

The Unforgettables made another appearancethis year

The audience for the last Red Faces - theywere very attentive!! It's all on tape too.

www.perthinternationaldance.org.au

To André or not too André?

In this year's competition the result wasAgung 1; André 0. Yes the winner wasMount Agung in Bali. The volcano blew itstop, messed up flights and left Andréstranded there 2628 km away when heshould have been here. Pretty maybe butfor us pretty awful.

We had no choice but to cancel our annualworkshop with André. Top marks to theteachers who picked up André at Perth airporton his way through to Adelaide and spentseveral hours receiving instruction on some ofthe dances he was planning on teaching.Volcano permitting André will be back in Perth29-30 June 2019.

Some of André's Dances 2018Many of André's dances have been taughton Monday and Saturday, including thefollowing:

Abdaj I Dajcovo Bulgaria

Ay Kizim Moldova

Batraneasca de laArbore

Romania

Cumbia Semana Columbia

De Vijfde de Beste Belgium - Flanders

Glasat Na Pirin Bulgaria

Hora de la Zorleni Romania

Hora din Humor Romania

Lapin Joiku Saami (N Finland)

Mori Cupi Kosturcanki Macedonia

Paiduska Aromani Romania

Smederevka Kolo Serbia

Zabolela Russia

Souleiado from LaurelI enjoyed transmitting some lively Frenchdances to Perth Internationals during myteaching months. Breton dances are usuallypopular and also provide a challenge as theyvary greatly across this Celtic region of Francefrom Ridées (repetitive line dances) to Avant-Deux dances (fast and ever changing).Sombre Soupçon from Alsace, a mixer, waswell received as was Branle de Trikot fromPicardie. We had a lot of laughs doing theMarin Congo from Gascony where eachcouple has to quickly find another couple todance with during the dance. I usually aim toteach one bourrée each time I teach andBourrée de St Pierre was the one I chose thisyear. These dances present rhythms, stepsand formations which are quite different tothose found in Eastern European cultures.Our group, Souleiado, has had a busy yearwith a trip to the National Folk Festival in Aprilfor 16 of us - 3 performances and 2 workshopsover the Easter weekend - then on toFairbridge with a Basque performance andthree shows in November, one of them beingmedieval and the other two Frenchcelebrations. I have taught in many schoolsover the year and gave workshops in Adelaideat the South Australian Teachers of Frenchconference in June, all expenses paid.Souleiado will call it a day at the end of thisyear with many fond memories of 25 years ofFrench dance lessons, outings, overseas andinterstate trips, bals folk, cultural events andworkshops. We are finishing on a high withexcellent performances over the last 12months and more workshops than ever before.I will do one final month of French danceteaching at PID in February. See you there!!

Laurel

Dancers at the Polish Night - 29 October

Photographers Martin Williams and John Bardill


PID Travellers 2017 and 2018

As usual some of our members have beenspread themselves around the world - hereare a few of their tales: First up fromGisela - recently in Cambodia - was't itVietnam last time?

Gisela's 10 days in Cambodia

A couple of hrs up to KL and easy hop toPhnom Phen. Plenty of good budgetaccommodation choices, an abundance ofmassage places (US$10 for 60min), foodgalore, bustling street life, smiling people. Thehorrors of Pol Pot not forgotten but a newgeneration embracing life - and growingtourism. It's safe, fascinating, colourful, hot,busy and relaxed all at the same time. The oldand the new, the beautiful and the ugly side byside, people ready and easy to connect with.We waved to the King driving past on hisIndependence parade, wandered the streets,recovered in a small hotel pool at end of theday and allowed a variety of hands to ease anyaches on the table.

A 6 hrs bus trip up to Siem Reap thewonderland of ancient Khmer temples, bestknown is Angkar Wat. Go see for yourself, theyare well worth a visit. Other day tours took usto a lake, the mountains and a floating village.

Loved the small scale acrobatic talentedhumorous circus show by the young troupe atPhare Circus. .... and this will be the mainimage remaining - young energetic positivepeople taking the country into the years ahead.

The thick mess of electric cables bunched upin big knots at every corner, traffic galore,plenty of rubbish around, 'tuc tucs' andscooters laden with families and goods - verysimilar to Vietnam street life - but the abundantlush greenery of palms and all kind of plants

everywhere softening and beautifying all of it.Delicious tropical fruit sold cheaply from streetcarts alongside curry, cakes and fried wormsand tarantulas - the night markets anexperience!!

Tourism has brought money and welcomebusiness but also waves of ugly plasticrubbish. Slow beginnings of recyclingattempts are being made, I have seenplastic being hand picked out of the bigrubbish bags as they are being collected atnight by trucks - very laborious, there has tobe a better way ...

Gisela Nov 2018

Paula’s Adventures in CUBA & Mongolia2018 has been a BIG year for me, travel wise!In the first half of the year I did the looooonghaul to Cuba and in the second half I flew duenorth to Mongolia, a much easier destinationfrom Perth and in the same time zone too.Cuba was exciting, noisy, vibrant and colourful.I loved it all! I travelled with a friend from Perthwho also loves to dance and so we prearranged through the travel company to have afew lessons, predominantly salsa. What fun!!!!Our lessons were held in old, run-downbuildings full of character and charm in OldHavana, Vinales and Trinidad. In eachlocation our dance partners were not old orrun-down but were gorgeous young Cubancreatures who had been dancing since beforethey could walk. In Cuba, age is meaninglesswhen it comes to dancing! One of my lessonswas for the Cuban Rumba because I reallylove the Rumba. What I discovered was thatthe Cuban Rumba has absolutely noresemblance to the Rumba we do here. It isAfro Cuban and stems from the slave days, soI had to try and look/move like an Afro Cuban.To describe this as a challenge is a grossunderstatement. It made salsa and the otherdances feel like a walk in the park. Oh well, itwas all part of the adventure!

Uber - Cuban style!


Near the end of September and into October Ispent two weeks in Outer Mongolia, a placewhich I can only describe as soul-capturing.The Mongolian steppes with snow-cappedmountains in the distance (by now everywherewould be looking white with snow) stretch forhundreds of miles and are home to nomadicfamilies who live in gers (as in ‘cares’) in thewarm months and are the traditional herders oftruly free-range Bactrian camels, cashmeregoats, Shaun the Sheep type sheep, horses,cows and yaks, depending on location.Mongolia’s population is between three andfour million and so outside the capital city,Ulaanbaatar (emphasis on the secondsyllable) people are almost as rare as trees.

My reason for being in Mongolia at that time ofyear was to attend the Golden Eagle Festivalin the western-most province of Bayan Ulgiiand if you have seen the documentary TheEagle Huntress you will understand mymotivation. Bayan Ulgii is home to theKazakhs, a different ethnic group from otherMongolians and who are the traditional eaglehunters. Words can’t fully describe the senseof awe and excitement I felt at being amongstthese people. What a privilege! The festivalitself was as wonderful and exciting as I knewit would be and being there will be treasuredas one of the best things I have ever done.When was the last time I did something for thefirst time? October 2018, when I stood next toan eagle hunter and a Golden Eagle sat on myright arm!

Paula Day

The PID Calendar for 2019Please look out for a copy of our PID calendarfor 2019 at dance sessions and keep an eyeon our Web-site to confirm events, dates andstart times.

Europe 2018 Dance Festivals John Whaite

This Australian winter I attended 3 dancefestivals in Europe – Le Son Continu inFrance, Le Grand Bal de l'Europe in France,and Andanças in Portugal.

Technically, Le Son Continu is a festival fortraditional musical instrument makers, but itincludes lots of dance and concerts. Standingin the wooded grounds of the Chateau d'Ars,surrounded by musicians testing instruments, itfeels like floating in a soundscape. For dance,there are two large venues, and 3 smaller siteswith time for informal events. And a bonus forme was to have the company of Pam andMartin Williams, Russell Johnsen from TheLast Five Coins, and Beatrice Suom andVirgile with new baby Andrea.

The Grand Bal de l'Europe is THE event forlovers of French folk dance. Two weeks, over20 dance lessons every day, over 15 dancesevery evening, 7 dance marquis, thousands ofdancers, and not just French dance. Almost allclasses have live music, and there are sometruly wonderful musicians. Again, I was lucky tohave the company of Muriel Willien-Blanchard,whom many of you met when she visited Pertharound Christmas time last year. I've broughtback a few dances from this – a couple of


Italian courentas, syrtos haniotikos fromGreece and dabke from Palestine – but thereal value of the festival is just having time toenjoy life and dance.

The Andanças festival in Portugal was new tome (as was Portugal). It was smaller than theGrand Bal (only 4 dance stages and 5 days),the level of dancing was lower, it had a stronglocal representation with customary dances,and a younger crowd. This year, the festivalwas set on a small hilltop in the village ofCastelo de Vide, and it coincided with aEuropean heatwave that was centered onPortugal, so the short walk from myaccommodation to the festival site was aserious undertaking.

The local customary dances were interesting,not for the dance, but for the experience. Inone dance, we circled around 4 women whowere beating square hand drums and singing.Basic steps to different parts of the music, forquite a long time.

But my outstanding memory from Andançaswas on a hot evening, a huge dance tentpacked full of dancers, shouting and jumpingwildly to the sounds of a hyperactive Italianband - so much wonderful energy. I'd like to goback. John Whaite

Anne’s dancing in the USA 2017I made a family-oriented visit to San Carlos,just south of San Francisco, at the end of 2017when my little grandson was born. Most of mytime was taken up with him and his parents butI was curious to see if there was aninternational dance group in the Bay area. Isoon discovered there is a rich culture ofinternational folk dance in this area, withseveral dance groups and musicians -

including the Stanford InternationalFolkdancers. They have been dancing in thearea since 1942, initially associated withcourses run out of Stanford University. Theymeet every Friday evening and I was delightedto attend many of their sessions. I wasimmediately welcomed and tagged on to theend of the line for the teaching. I also have tothank a lovely couple who made this possible,offering me a lift to and from the venue.

Talking to the people at the regular dancenights, most had been dancing for 30-40 yearsand many started dancing while at university –as one guy said to me, “it was a great place tomeet girls”. As you can imagine, the agerange of their current dancers is very similar toours in PID, but they attract greater numbersthan we do – and more men! Their repertoireof dances is similar to ours, as is their format,with teaching followed by free choice ofdances. They seem able to attract externalteachers quite regularly (there would be amuch larger pool to choose from throughoutthe US) and I attended a workshop by abeautiful dancer visiting from Bulgaria – ElenaDimitrova. It was also interesting to see thatthey had also learnt similar dances to what welearnt from Andre last year. The group enjoyparty nights, often with local musicians – andthey really know how to dress up, such as forHalloween! We were treated to a visit by aBulgarian band, Kabile, who we dancedaround as they played in the centre of theroom.

The real highlight for me was attending theannual Kolo Festival held in San Franciscoover Thanksgiving, which attracts dancers fromall over California and further afield. I spenttwo amazing days there - danced pretty solidlyeach day, finishing at midnight. There werefour teachers, amazing bands in 2 differenthalls so that there was music all the time -including a brilliant local band led by a verytalented musician, Bill Cope, that seemed tohave members in either venue at eachsession. The energy of the dancing wasphenomenal - so many people (200 plusprobably at the evening parties and 100+ atthe lessons) and everyone seemed to be agood dancer. My room mate at the hotel wasfrom Los Angeles and she just loves Israeli,which she teaches there.


The teachers included Yves Moreau, who wasvery surprised to be greeted by someone fromPerth and says a warm hello to everyone heknows in Perth. I was delighted to meet himas I’ve heard his name mentioned so manytimes in connection with our dances. He re-taught some of the dances from his first redalbum and gave a wonderful account of how itcame to be made 50 yrs ago on his second tripto Bulgaria, where he was befriended by manydancers. The other teachers were JohnFilcich, who started the festival over 65 yrsago, having lived, breathed, researched andtaught Balkan music for so many years – hestill taught us some dances at the age of 93!Michael Ginsburg is based in New York andhas a rich interest in Balkan music - he taughtBulgarian and Pontian dances. Last but notleast, John Morovich was a very energeticCroatian dancer and brilliant musician. Therewere also workshops for Balkan and Bulgariansinging.

If you are ever in San Francisco aroundThanksgiving, I would definitely recommendthis event – and I’m also sure the StanfordInternational Folkdancers would give you avery warm welcome if you turned upunannounced one evening!

Did I have a good time? Yes - it was justfantastic Anne

HOT, HOT, HOT in Europe - Martin & Pam

While Perth was suffering through a cold andwet winter we were slaving over a hot Europe.We motor-homed 8000km through 9 countries;definitely a touring holiday and to be honestwe didn't do or see a lot of dancing.

As John says we did meet him in mid-July atthe le Son Continu festival near St Chatier inthe Indre Département of France for somedancing. We also met Russell of Last FiveCoins fame who was there with wife and somemuso friends.

The festival focus was on selling instruments -Hurdy-Gurdies, pipes, accordions - with some150 stalls and instrument makers from acrossEurope. Many of those were quite fascinatingbut there wasn't really much dancing. Havingsaid that some people did do a lot of dancing,getting so revved up they went through themain stage!! That was a trigger to limit the

number of dancers on stage!! The main stagewas in the full sun - it was hot remember - andoverall we were rather disappointed with thefestival. As with most French dance festivalswe have been to there was so much repetition- we did Circassian Circle about fifty times, orwas it 51? La Chapellois also got a hammering- again and again and again! There werehowever some really good jamming sessions.The crowds were an issue - for 5€ locals couldget in for the whole day until 2 am and therewere just too many day visitors.

There were two concerts each night over thefour days which were all really enjoyable -warm evenings, nice outdoor venue and someamazing groups - mostly Celtic .The camping was close by and very cosy.

Here's a pic of us with John and our spot. Theneighbours were so close. If there had been afire it would have been a nightmare!!We did see a bit of other dancing on holiday -at an evening festival near Strasbourg whichincluded flag wavers from Belgium and aMexican group from Puebla .. ..

and in Austria, on a roundabout near theStams Monastery, we felt that the dancing wasa bit wooden. The hills might have been alivewith the sound of music but the dancers weredefinitely not!! Martin Williams


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