|
[workshops] |
Border Morris Workshop at Coombe Bissett
Andy Anderson 16.02.2003
For this workshop I wanted to revisit the various styles of Border Morris. Originally I had a game plan based on a time-line, to lead in to what I fondly imagined would be the Molly session that followed. Just before the workshop I discovered that the following session would in fact be Cotswold, so I re-jigged the material on a geographical basis. My deepest heartfelt thanks to the long-suffering Nigel Sparkes who was totally unfazed at getting a phone-call the night before, to say "I've changed it all, we'll discuss the music when we get there."
It was cold, it was early, it was Sunday. Here's a summary of the introduction I used while people stretched out and warmed up.
Chris Cawte had accidentally coined the term Border Morris in the 1950's. When I first ran workshops on Border Morris, it was just becoming accepted. There were a few sides around but many people still saw it in the way Sharp described it, "A debased form of Morris". The chief advantage that border had was that it was "okay" to make up dances, which really wasn't the case with Cotswold. It had to be okay, because there were very few collected dances around.
Then, many of us thought that there were three distinct groups of dances and were trying to work out why. The geography of the area, ranging from the Vale of Evesham through the rugged Clee Hills to the cradle of the industrial revolution at Ironbridge Gorge, might have had something to do with it. Or, it might have been because the dances were collected over a period of some sixty years, as the tradition was dying out.
Since then, an awful lot of research has passed under the bridge, some of it mine. What has been achieved in twenty years' work? Well, various other similar forms of Morris have been discovered and become popular, allowing more teams to perform dances from their own area. A few more "collected" dances are recognised. But unfortunately from the point of view of simplicity, as more references have come to light the situation over "grouping" has become more muddied. In geographical terms I can now only find two areas: the Vale of Evesham and "the rest". There are still several different styles, but geographically they're more mixed than seemed to be the case in 1980.
Possibly dances with the dancers in a straight line are the oldest form of Bedlam Morris. There are three extant collected choreographies: Brimfield, Bromsberrow Heath and Upton Snodsbury.
Bromsberrow Heath - set of six in a line
As collected, all there is of Bromsberrow Heath is an alternating hey, walked with a swaggering step. Alternate this with "napping", forehand tips sticking whilst capering. Keep going, speeding up gradually until the collection has been taken, then dance off. We danced the dance just like this. I pointed out that (a) the dance is probably too boring to be done regularly except as a parody and (b) because of the music, most people were starting to do single-step anyway.
Broom's Green
We looked at Single-Stepping
Many of the sides you'll see nowadays raise the knee up to horizontal in the single step, with the emphasis on the "up" in the same way as Seven Champions do it. However, that's more emphatic than really suits the dance we're doing - bearing in mind that we're doing it mostly because you started doing single-step instead of swaggers anyway. So, for today, unless you are in a set all from one side who do something else, we'll do the stepping which Stags use, a low single-step with the emphasis on the 'down' and the shuffle. Take care not to land directly on the heels, and use the calf muscles to absorb as much of the energy as you can. Like everything else, it takes practice.
In order to make the dance more watchable, we just add in some country-dance figures:
Set of six with short sticks. Start with napping, then hey, napping, hands around, napping, back-to-back, napping, hey into ring to dance off. Because we were using long sticks, we did alternate tips and buts for the "napping"
Having modified the dance like this, I prefer not to call it Bromsberrow Heath any more. A few years ago the parish clerk emailed me and as far as I'm aware some of the locals, including descendants of the original informants, have done the dance locally. Instead, I use the name Broom's Green, the next village up the road. It never, as far as I know, had a morris side.
Upton Snodsbury
I told some of the story of Dr Cawte's travels around Ludlow in 1957, whilst people got their breath back. Chris drove to the Ludlow area (he being the one with a car) to follow up some enigmatic references to dancing - references like "A morris dancer is thought to run a milk bar in Ludlow" He found a lot of descriptions - including E C Jones of Orleton, but not much actual choreography. The whole set of notes, from the Helm mss. at University College London, are here.
Then, having elected not to do the double-step version of Broom's Green, I decided on a whim to add in a piece of pure idiocy. It's astounding what you can get people to do if you're standing on stage.
I showed the rudimentary step Mr Jones had shown Dr Cawte, a sort of jigging hornpipe step hopping from foot to foot. Nigel played the six-note fragment that was all Jones could remember. Then I showed how the step could be put together with Upton Snodsbury. Of the latter, Rich Holmes has said:
"A particularly challenging collected dance to reconstruct, in that the original description consists of about one sentence. It would be only slightly more difficult to make a performable dance out of Cecil Sharp's mother's maiden name."
One interpretation would be three people in a line, two sticking and one stepping on the spot. I swapped in the Jones jig-step for stepping on the spot, having people hold their (long) stick over their heads, keeping it level whilst swaying their bodies with the step.
The progression is (three in a line) one and two stick, three steps; then one and two cross, so one sticks with three whilst two steps; then one and three cross and three sticks with two whilst one steps. And so on. I think it lasted about forty-five seconds, but everyone seemed to be laughing at the joke by the end. We had to do one more repeat for the hosts to get a picture, the delay being due to the stunned look on the cameraman's face.
Weobley Marsh
Sharp collected the original notation of Leominster/Dilwyn/Weobley on Boxing Day 1909. But he may well have had it demonstrated by Ella Leather's schoolchildren's side. I don't know what happened that day. Sharp's field note book is missing nd we must rely on Roy Dommett's transcript, made before it vanished. The tune book, available on microfilm at Cecil Sharp House, may give a clue, however. Normally immaculate, the pages for this day start with several crossings out after starting to write out just a few notes. I saw some faces at the start of the workshop who may have had the same problem. (In my case, sadly, it was just lack of sleep - the new handouts were drying in the car on the way across). In any case, there clearly was a four-person dance from somewhere in the area.
Red Stags' second ever set of border dances were based on the Weobley material. Weobley marsh is the next village down the road: in this case not only is there no evidence of a morris side, but the place only has about six houses even today. Stags had three dances, completely against the way that sides from the area worked, but we needed the material. We dropped them a few years ago and this is an attempt to use the material, together with more that's come to light since, to construct a more authentic dance.
Step: single-step
Set: Four in a square
Chorus: The intended chorus uses two short sticks each: 1 and 3 bang both sticks on the ground, then clash in front of them, then clash sideways onto sticks that 2 and 4 hold out to their sides. Then repeat with 2 and 4 clashing, 1 and 3 holding their sticks out. The do eight single steps round in a ring clockwise to places.
But, no plan survives contact with reality, so we substituted one l;ong stick each, first diagonal clashing twice on the ground, then clashing tips twice across the set. Repeat with second diagonal and then dance round eight single steps, sticks on shoulders.
Figures: Round Stars, Bombast, Face Up and Sidestep.
Round Stars
Move into the centre, sticks still on shoulders, put right shoulders in togehter and dance round keeping close in for eight steps. Then turn in, sticking the left hands in to make a star to come back, as wide as possible for contrast.
Bombast – this should be a square hey but we like this figure, originated by Headcorn Morris
Basically, what happens is that each person takes four steps to move counter-clockwise one position, number one to number four position, four to three and so on. In number two and four positions, you simply cast out and dance into the next position round. Number one and two positions turn in, then pass right shoulders and dance out to the next position. So, every repeat, two people are moving down the side whilst two people are dancing round each other in the middle of the set. Note that what you do changes with position, so each dancer alternates going along the sides with passing right shoulders with the opposites.
Face up and Sidestep
All face up towards the music. Top couple do open sidesteps across the set to opposite place (but no further), first diagonal passing in front, whilst the bottom couple do four single-steps up outside the tops to make a line. Now bottoms cast back to places and remain facing down whilst tops sidestep back to places and turn on the last beat. Repeat, bottom couple sidestepping, tops dancing down into line, then casting back to places.
Drake's Broughton
The dances from the Vale of Evesham form a distinct group within the material normally known as “Border Morris”. There is quite a lot of collected material, by Border Morris standards, although the majority of it is from a very small number of informants. Some of it needs to be taken with a pinch of salt and without wishing to be too controversial, the whole may be rather more precise than it is accurate. Some of the stories are fascinating, but too long to recount here.
However, two examples will suffice. Roy has told me on a few occasions that "Peopleton" was more constructed than reconstructed for a folk camp in the area. It's now an accepted part of the repertoire. Maud Karpeles collected the "standard" dance "Upton Upon Severn" in a pub. But only one of the dancers knew the figures and one could step. The others were ringers who'd been persuaded to walk through the dances for an hour or two.
Nonetheless, we can say that the Vale of Evesham dances are in general for larger numbers than the rest, and that in general they're the only traditions that had handkerchief dances as well as stick dances. These may be due to the comparative affluence of the area and also to the fact that the area is very close to the Cotswolds, and there was probably a fair amount of cross-fertilisation.
This dance uses elements from Peopleton, Pershore and Evesham. A main source was one of Dave Jones' informants, probably Bill Scarrot although I'll never know for certain now. It was constructed for a workshop a number of years ago but still illustrates the differences from the other dance styles quite well. Given the style of this workshop, you'll be unsurprised to learn that Drakes' Broughton is the next village down the road – one where there is evidence that dances were performed, but which never had a morris side.
Set: eight in two lines, four facing four. Identify the "top" four and the "bottom" four (plus first and second diagonals in each for two figures I didn't teach).
Chorus: eight single-steps on the spot, sticks on shoulders. This is "treading water" a genuine technique, but also useful for a workshop where some dancers may not have got back to place. Then eight steps sticking, tips (forehand) and butts (backhand) alternately on the strong beat of each step.
Figures: Note that the 'B' (figure) music is twice the length of the 'A' (chorus) music. Each figure is done first by the bottom four, whilst the top four continue sticking. Then the top four repeat the figure whilst the bottom four stick. I actually only taught small rounds and back to back, but four other figures are cross-over, hands around swing and stars.
Rounds: eight single-steps round, turn in, eight single-steps back to places.
Back to Back Pass partner right shoulders for four steps, come back to place for four steps. Then repeat passing left shoulders.
Cross Over Rounds: eight single-steps round, turn in, eight single-steps back to places.
Hands Around Swap the stick to the left hand, grasp right elbows and dance round for eight steps, turn out, swap the stick back, and dance to places.
Swing Swap the stick to the left hand, place right arm round partner's waist and swing for eighteen steps.
Stars Four person star, start by swapping stick to left hand, star right for eight steps, then turn out, swap the stick back and dance eight steps to places.
End the dance by sticking, then form a ring and dance round with the sticks pointing in, and then dance off, raising sticks to shoulders.