There's a case to be made for the roots of the dance going back into the late sixties, when I was at school with Roy Dommett's two eldest sons. Roy was working on the Cotswold tradition from the village of Ducklington, doing final research, and 'tidying it up' for the Black Book and I was involved on the fringes. Then there's a case to be made for it going back to the mid seventies when Kris, the current fore of Jackstraws Morris was at Bath University. She danced with Bath Ladies and it was natural that they danced Ducklington, since Bath Ladies was Betty and Tubby Reynolds' team and Tubby and Roy worked together on just about everything. And natural too, with several friends at Bath, that I would commute from Southampton to Bath for various Morris events and that I'd watch Bath Ladies with immense interest, notably several particularly interesting dances composed in the Ducklington style.

Then, there's a case to be made for it dating to when Kris, as fore of Jackstraws, re-introduced Ducklington and we were sitting in the pub discussing the old Bath dances: in particular, one called "Clevedon Bridge". The dance has an odd, 14-bar structure and there wasn't a tune with it, so for the time being I did one of my usual hatchet jobs on Month of May, Brackley. It was only at the first practice that she reminded me that there were slows, but fortunately slows music for set dances is usually constructed in a fairly standard way, so after the usual few minutes' argument about bass chords with Ivan North (who figures further in this saga a little later) the hatchet job proceeded and we soon had a score to present to the third musician. Being the kind of people we are, we kept it as a surprise for him and presented it just before we needed to play it the next week. (Or maybe we forgot, but that wouldn't make as good a story.) I played for Roy at a workshop that weekend and over a beer or three I asked him about the original tune. "Fine" he said "if you've got one, I'll tell anyone else who asks about it to get in touch." Yeah, okay Roy, uh, thanks.

But in the end, I really think it was Ivan North's fault. Like me, he plays for a Border side as well as for Cotswold, in his case 'Loose Women'. When we got to the slows bit in "Cleveden Bridge", he started single-stepping to it. Then he started doing the rounds and stuff from the Cotswold dance and miming Border-style turns and swinging a stick over his head (he was supposed to be playing at the time, but Ian's like that). It would, he mused, make a great Border dance, much more interesting than this Cotswold stuff (he always says that as well - I guess when he plays for Loose Women he says it the other way round). And the rest is history.
 
Part of it real history. I was teaching some of the Mediæval steps from Arbeau, and I'd run a workshop based on the Malvern description. So, talk of different stepping was rife (well, someone had mentioned it a couple of times). The "pieds joints frappes" from Arbea's "Mourisque" were perfect to fill the spare four bars I had in the twelve bar chorus. And I sort of had a couple of figures I wanted to try out for my work on Weobley. And I had to change it to be four people rather than six, but apart from the tune, two figures, the chorus and the number of dancers it's the same dance. Honest.

The name was added for the Edinburgh tour. Claret and Oysters may sound like a fine meal today, if you like claret and like oysters, at least. But in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries it was a bit different. If someone in one of the closes got the plague, sometimes they walled everyone in. But it would be inhumane to let them starve, so they pushed cheap food under the door. Claret was the cheapest wine and a fair alternative to water, which wasn't available (anyway vinegar was thought to ward off the plague). And oysters were used as ballast in the merchant boats, then just dumped, so basket-loads could be collected free.

Formation

A set of four. Since the set has a defined 'top' and 'bottom', we number it clockwise from the caller

although the dance is seldom in that shape. Note that this isn't the conventional way of numbering and that the notes refer to this numbering.

Stepping

The dance is designed to fit with Stags' (or perhaps my) low single-step. It's described at length elsewhere but the chief attribute is that the stress is on the downbeat of the single-step.

The first special step for this dance is modified to fit with this step: I'd recommend anyone considering using this dance without a low single-step to go back to "Orchesographie" (the Julia Sutton version of Arbeau is available in Dover paperback) and working it up from the description of "Pieds Joints Frappes" there; it'll probably be less work than making this fit.

The steps come in pairs, right and left, with the timing the same as in the single-step. Place the right foot slightly to the right of your body-weight and with the toe pointing out at 45 degrees. Emphasise the step into position and use the rest of the beat to bring the heel to the ground without over-stressing the knee and ankle. On the second beat, swing the left leg in a slight arc so that the left heel strikes the right heel, making the bells ring. Start to shift the body-weight slightly left, so that you are prepared for the step onto the left on the third beat, then swing the right leg to strike the left ankle and complete a pair of steps. The timing is STAMP-click STAMP-click in the same way as STAMP-shuffle STAMP-shuffle. It takes time and it may hurt at first until you get it right. I get the impression that most people with a step-dance background (tap as a child, or step-clog perhaps) will take to this easily, whereas those who, like me, have none, may struggle at first. Like everything, it takes practice: then, when you suddenly "get it", you can't figure out what the fuss was all about.

After that, the other step isn't special, for Cotswold dancers at least. But, lots of people who do border morris only ever do one step, so I'll describe it here anyway. What we have is side-steps across the set. For the dancer on the left of the couple, the side-step is "open" from the right, they're "closed" in Cotswold terms. The step is right-left-right-left, so from the left of the set step out to the right, close with the left, step out again with the right and close with the left. From the right (difficult) side, bring the right leg across behind the left, step out to the left, bring the right across behind again and step onto the left. The closed side-step leaves you in an awkward position so the two single-steps on the spot allow you to get sorted out. Since the right-hand position is harder, our convention is that the dancer on the right moves straight across, whilst the dancer on the left, who has the easier time stepping, moves behind and takes responsibility for collision-avoidance.

Chorus

Change places up and down the sides of the set, one with four, two with three. Everyone should follow a path which is an arc of a circle and the paths are bowed away from the centre of the set. One and three (first diagonals) go outside, two and four (second diagonals) go inside. This should look like two half-circles, one rotating inside the other, rather than crossing over in lines. This is followed two pairs of the kick-steps; right, left, right, left. Then two sets of forehand sticking XXX- XXX-. Each portion of this takes the same length of time - four single-steps for the half-rounds, four kick-steps, and two sets of sticking.

Then repeat to place. Note that this is twelve bars rather than sixteen. And it starts the dance. So the Once to yourself is all you get, folks. If you miss coming in on the B, the poor musician has to play a complete repeat. There ain't no way out of the B into another A, which works reliably enough to be confident of coming in.

Figures

Sidesteps

The pair nearest the musician (one and two) face up and cross past each other using two sidesteps, with the dancer on the right going in front of the one on the left. When they get to the opposite position they do two single-steps in position. Meanwhile, the other two dance up the set on the outside and beyond the top two. The top two then side-step back to place, with the dancer on the right going in front again, whilst the other two cast out and dance back to place. Now repeat, but with the bottoms, who are already facing down, crossing, whilst tops dance down and back.

Out and Swing

The "standard" version of the figure: face across, then one dances past two, three past four, passing right shoulders, four steps out of the set. Then take four steps to turn and come back into the set facing in the opposite and moving the stick to the left hand. Put your right arm round the opposite's waist, and swing for about seven steps, breaking early enough to end on your own side in good time to be balanced to turn out for the chorus.

"Z" Hey

First diagonals pass right shoulders, turn right and pass left shoulders with the person they are now facing to start a hey for four on the diagonal. The hey ends with the "ends" going straight back to places whilst the first diagonals pass right shoulders before dancing back to place.

Sequence

(Once to Yourself - A Music)
Chorus (B Music - if you miss it, play a whole A and B again!)
Side-steps
Chorus
Out and Swing
Chorus
"Z" Hey
Chorus

Music

I don't "do" ABC, which is the fairly standard music notation used for email by people on the MDDL. If I use alphanumeric notation at all, I use a competing and much older system called AMPLE. So I am indebted to Debbie Lewis for sending me this notation of my own tune. I'm not 100% sure whether she originated it - if someone else did, please mail me and I'll credit them.
 

T: Claret and Oysters

C: Andy Anderson

M: 4/4

K: G

L: 1/8

E2 |: G2 G2 GF G2 | A2 B2 c2 d2 | e2 ge dB G2 \

|1 GF G2 A2 BA :|2 AG F2 G4 ||

A2 AA A2 B2 | cd c2 Bc d2 | g2 d2 g2 d2 | cd c2 Bc d2 | \

g2 d2 g2 d2 | cB A2 G4 ||

 
I might put a .gif and a midi file here as well, when I get them finished.