Maari Glendenning (center) goes through the bridge while her dance partner Grace Walker (far left) takes the outside during a contra dance at the Damariscotta Baptist Church on Jan. 9. The series of community contra dances in Damariscotta and New Harbor are welcoming of all ages and abilities. (Bisi Cameron Yee photo)
Arlo Rudy wasn’t sure he wanted to dance. Six years old and shy by nature, he kept close to the walls, half-hidden behind a bench, watching as fingers flew on flutes and fiddles and lines of dancers young and old bowed and curtseyed in the center of the fellowship hall of the Damariscotta Baptist Church.
By the end of the evening Arlo was in the thick of it, lifting his arms as high as he could while the tallest dancers stooped to pass beneath them and giving in to the dizzying joy as his older brother swung him in a circle, both boys grinning ear to ear.
The community contra dances in Damariscotta and New Harbor were willed into being about 10 years ago by a core group of local musicians and dancers who wanted a convenient place to practice their skills with an engaged audience.
“We figured community dance for the community,” said Kaity Newell, who along with Sandy Davis leads the seasonal dances from early fall into mid spring.
Contra dancing is a form of social dancing in which long lines of couples are facing, or “contrary,” to each other. The dances are easy to learn and traditionally accompanied by live music.
“The first thing to learn is how to walk to the music,” Davis said. “Most people get that intuitively.”
Caleb Rudy (front left), 11, dances down the center with younger brother Arlo, 6 during a contra dance at the Damariscotta Baptist Church on Jan. 9. The boys parents smile as they dance behind them. (Bisi Cameron Yee photo)
Next come the figures, the ways in which dancers interact with each other. Crossing over, forming right-hand or left-hand stars, casting off, peeling the banana, going through the tunnel, progressing down the center aisle and back.
And swinging one’s partner.
“When you’re swinging or turning somebody around, you give weight,” Davis said. “You pull a little bit towards them, they pull a little bit towards you, and now you’ve got centrifugal force working for you … and that’s the most fun.”
Newell is the caller, walking dancers through the steps until everyone has the gist of it. Then the music starts and she continues the prompts.
“The caller’s job is to just keep everyone happily dancing,” Newell said. “And then if they seem to be getting it, I sometimes call out ‘You’re on your own!’”
The live music comes courtesy of Newell’s Oyster Creek Fiddlers and friends. The dances have an open band policy and her fiddle students are often joined by additional musicians with an array of acoustic instruments. It’s not unusual to see a cello, a banjo, a hammer dulcimer, or a concertina being played.
Davis favors a penny whistle himself, though he joked the instrument cost far more than a penny.
Newell prepares a setlist for each dance and advises drop-ins to sit in the background, listen, and join in when they’re ready.
The songs are generally simple and straightforward. In the past they were usually played by amateur musicians who learned by ear.
“They needed to be memorable,” Davis said. “Because most people didn’t read music. They didn’t need to.”
That didn’t preclude experimentation though. Newell called one tune “a nice canvas for things to happen,” admitting the possibility of ornaments and other musical flourishes to keep things interesting.
“The dancers need the tune to support them,” Davis said. “The really great dance tunes have lots of quarter notes and lots of space. They really breathe at the end of each section.”
Those great tunes also have a place where the melody soars.
“It just wants to make you look to the heavens and spread your arms out and take all this energy in,” Davis said.
Contra dance grew out of the old world dances once held in granges and town halls with long center aisles that were conducive to dancing in lines as opposed to squares or circles.
“It was the time when people got together and built community and danced and played music and met their neighbors. So it goes back,” Newell said. “It’s got those roots.”
And it blossomed in rural areas like Maine where people didn’t have access to the benefits of a large city or much disposable income to spend on dance lessons.
“In a rural area this is how you learn,” Newell said.
She likes to teach the old Scottish dances like “Lady of the Lake” or “Haste to the Wedding” that date back to the 18th and 19th centuries.
“I really love to link it to the music and live this tradition that’s been going on for so long,” she said.
That tradition almost disappeared after WW II with the advent of radio and movies. Newell and Davis were among those who helped revive contra dancing locally in the 1970s and according to Newell, the tradition continues to expand.
“You know it’s gone out west now,” she said. “A lot of the younger folks travel to do contra dances all over the country. I know it’s happening everywhere.”
Davis agrees. He sees contra dance continuing to evolve with new dances being choreographed and new tunes being composed in places like Hallowell and Portland.
“This is a living tradition,” Davis said. “And like all living traditions, they ebb and flow.”
Newell was first introduced to contra dance while growing up in England. In high school she began to seek out traditional music forms, attending cèilidhs and folk festivals. And she never stopped – when she moved to Maine in 1979 she became a part of the contra dance resurgence happening in the New England states.
Brittany Gill, who regularly attends the Damariscotta dances, calls Newell the spark that inspires dancers and musicians alike.
“She finds those wall flowers that are nervous about dancing … and she just draws them out. And suddenly there’s a whole set out on the floor and she’s got everybody doing the steps. She’s just got a subtle, beautiful way of engaging people and teaching them and wanting everybody to be part of it,” Gill said. “I think ultimately she just loves community. She loves dancing. I’ve seen her come to the dances exhausted, hungry, tired, and by the end she’s like, ‘Let’s do another one. We have time for just one more.’”
Davis discovered contra dancing when he was 10 at a New Year’s Eve event in Andover. He’s in his 70s now but still remembers being amused that the band called the Melody Men had a female piano player.
“They would go from town to town, move around, play each other’s dances,” he said of the bands of the 1940s and ‘50s. “It was a hopping scene.”
An instructor at the Maine Fiddle Camp and a founding member of the Roaring Jelly Contra Dance Band when he lived in Massachusetts, Davis is an encyclopedia of contra dance knowledge.
Gill called Newell and Davis the grandparents of the newest contra dancers.
“They learned from a dying tradition,” she said. “And they’ve really brought it back to life and are passing it on to the next generation.”
That next generation is represented by families like the Rudys. While the Damariscotta contra dance was their first, it’s not likely to be their last. And next time they plan to bring friends.
“I’ve never been to another contra dance, but I feel like this crew was especially kind and welcoming to everyone at every level and age. And height,” Jackie Rudy said.
Caleb, who at 11 is just on the cusp of his teens, said the dance was one of the most fun things he’s ever done.
“And he’s already starting to get embarrassed when we try to give him a kiss goodbye, you know,” said his mom. “So it was a really fun experience to have with him – to be able to physically be dancing and goofing around in that way can be hard as they become teenagers and young men.”
As for 6-year-old Arlo, “We weren’t exactly sure how this was going to pan out,” Jackie Rudy said. “But once he started dancing, we couldn’t get him off the dance floor.”
Community contra dances in Damariscotta are held at the Damariscotta Baptist Church. The last two dances of the season are Friday, March 13 and Friday, April 10 at 6:30 p.m.
Family contra dances in New Harbor are held at the Willing Helpers Hall. The last two dances of the season are Sunday, March 22 and Sunday, April 26 at 3 p.m.
A freewill donation of $5 to $10 per person is requested. Proceed benefit local nonprofit organizations.
For more information follow Damariscotta Community Contra Dance on Facebook or call Davis at 677-6647.
(Bisi Cameron Yee is a freelance photojournalist and reporter based in Nobleboro. To contact her, email cameronyeephotography@gmail.com.)
Andrew Donaldson (center) is framed by dancing feet at the Damariscotta Baptist Church on Jan. 9. Contra dancing in Maine goes back well over 100 years and is often based on traditional dances and folk music from the British Isles. (Bisi Cameron Yee photo)
