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Megan Miller, 13, laughs as she attempts a step during a rehearsal of Colonial-style dances in Louisa County.
Jack Maus plays 18th-century music on the keyboard during a recent rehearsal of Colonial period dancing. 'There are Colonial dance cells all over this area,' Maus says.
A love of 18th-century English country dancing draws young and old to Friday night gatherings in the Louisa County hamlet of Cuckoo. |
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.
"There are pattern companies that make period-appropriate patterns," Petry-Maus said. She makes all her own costumes, from the stays out, and makes costumes for some others as well.
At the fancy balls the gentlemen and boys wear knee breeches, frock coats and lace jabots on their shirts. The girls and ladies are clad in stays, petticoats and pannier dresses. They dance the Whirligig (1651), Apley House (1703) and Love's Triumph (1713).
"There are Colonial dance cells all over this area," Jack Maus said, citing groups in Richmond, Charlottesville, Staunton and Alexandria, as well as the Fredericksburg and Williamsburg groups.
Each group hosts a ball to which the other groups are invited. The Louisa County folks have their event in May; the Fredericksburg group waits until fall.
Maus and Kathy Whittle of Chester have formed a musical group called Wood Duck that performs 17th- and 18th-century dance music at various events during the year. Their next gig is a ball during a Revolutionary War re-enactment at Battersea Plantation in April. The event will commemorate the 225th anniversary of the Battle of Petersburg.
"There are people who re-enact the battles; our main interest is the culture," Maus said.
Tina Buchanan said the aim of the Rappahannock Colonial Heritage Society is similar.
"So many other groups re-enact the American Revolution. We people the town," she said. "And dancing is such a big part of that. Virginians were known for dancing; they loved it above all things."
She has been a member of the society since its formation. It's an activity that appeals on multiple levels, Buchanan said.
"I love dancing, I love dress- up, I love history, I love Virginia," the Spotsylvania native said.
A member of the Louisa group discovered his own appreciation of dancing, much to his surprise.
"It's something everyone can do. You don't have to be particularly talented," said Paul Sherman. "I was convinced I had two left feet, and that was incurable. Turned out, with persistence, neither one was true."
To reach LUCIA ANDERSON:
Email: landerson@freelancestar.com
