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Revolutionary footwork; Local dance group gets leg up on 18th century
Toe-tapping tunes, intricate movements and fancy apparel make 18th-century English country dancing fun for young and old alike.
By LUCIA ANDERSON
Date published: 3/12/2006
GLANCING periodically at the paper clutched in his hand, Jerry Reynolds was keeping his charges under tight control.
"Right hands across halfway. Turn single. Second couple cast, followed by first, and end in line of four, second couple in center. All up and back a double. End with first couple above, all improper."
Astonishingly, all 16 people in the room moved together at his direction, apparently comprehending the arcane commands. Dancers moved gracefully in and out as patterns formed, dissolved and reformed.
Their feet kept time to 300-year-old tunes played by Jack Maus on keyboard and Steven Hickman on violin.
"It's a whole other world out here," said DeLaura Padovan, the fiddler's wife.
The group, which laughingly calls itself the Cuckoo Assembly after the Louisa County hamlet where practice takes place, was polishing its dancing skills, getting ready for last weekend's big George Washington Ball in Williamsburg. That statewide gathering also included members of the Rappahannock Colonial Heritage Society, which is based in Fredericksburg.
The Louisa group had its start with the bicentennial celebrations in 1976. Mona Harkrader was co-chairman of the Louisa County Bicentennial Ball and wanted to be able to perform dances of the Revolutionary period, according to her husband.
"We went to Williamsburg for 10 weeks" to learn dances, Ward Harkrader said. "We'd go down on Mondays and teach them up here on Fridays."
There were 21 couples who danced for the bicentennial event. These days, the group attracts from 10 to 30 people to the Friday night gatherings at Gilboa Christian Church in Cuckoo. This tiny crossroads where U.S. 522 splits south from U.S. 33 is 11 miles from the Spotsylvania County line at Lake Anna.
The Cuckoo Assembly is an eclectic group that includes a retired circuit court judge, a trial lawyer, a high school teacher, an organic gardener and a real estate agent. At least half of the dancers are under 18, all the way down to 5-year-old Maren Hickman.
"We're working on the next generation," said Linda Petry-Maus, wife of the keyboardist.
In fact, a large part of the charm of 18th-century dancing is that it's something that families do together, Harkrader said. Grandparents, parents, teenagers and young children all join in the fun.
The Fredericksburg society started as a Scottish dance class in 1994.
"It segued into teaching English country dance," said Elaine Spurgeon, dance mistress for the Rappahannock Colonial Heritage Society. "And after we started dancing we realized there's a whole set of 18th-century clothing that goes along with this, that's period-appropriate."
Spurgeon said they concentrate on the years 1770 to 1774 because there was a lot going on during that period.
Most members of the society make their own costumes, she said. They research styles, fabrics and fabric design.
"We try to be as authentic as we can reasonably be in the 21st century," Spurgeon said.
That is true of the Cuckoo group as well.
Date published: 3/12/2006
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