Bush Dancing at Bundanoon

Well the wonderful weekend of bush dancing at Bundanoon, the June long weekend DanceFest, has splashed across the scene once again. As always, it is over too quickly after months of preparation and anticipation.

We arrived a few minutes after the start of the Sunday Night Bush Ball and found the first dance in full swing. Peter Ellis from Bendigo calling Garibaldi's March-Waltz.

Paul Carr from Canberra calling the Antrim Square Set:

Bush dancing is unique in my experience with the dances drawn from so many traditions, and the variety in the set formations, music, stepping and dance styles. It is accessible because many of these dances are done in a faster and simpler way than the originals, and dances are called. The sets offer a particularly social way of mixing, along with the couples dances that are always enjoyable.

Bundanoon reminded me once again how blessed we are to have so many wonderful musicians in what I loosely call the bush dancing milieu. They played for literally dozens of workshops and dances over the weekend, and their versatility and talent had to be seen to be believed. And there was no stopping them. The music during the breaks and late into the night added so much to the ambience. I can't imagine what it would be like without that live musical dimension.


We will keep on dancing as long as we can, but we are retiring from helping to run dancing, and this was our last year on the Bundanoon committee. David Johnson of Penrose is the artistic director and driving force behind Bundanoon, and a pleasure to work with. We provided our thoughts as members of the committee chaired by David, and the committee divided up the responsibilities amongst willing volunteers. We took care of refreshments and liaised with the caterers, and a few other odd jobs allocated by the committee. If you would like to help, maybe with these jobs or maybe other responsibilities entirely, why not contact David by email dave at bushtraditions dot org (www.bushtraditions.org)?

Regards
Lance