Deuce Williams - Patter
These are two clips of Deuce Williams calling. The first we think was recorded in New England in the late 1960s - 1970s; the second is a California recording from 1977.
Jim Mayo writes: "Deuce Williams was one of the early and quite possibly the best of, "sight" callers. He lived in Michigan and traveled quite a bit in the late 1960's and early 1970's. I hired him to share dances with me and he often stayed with us. One memorable event that I have told about often was the night in the early 1970's when he was staying with us and came with me to my Monday night club dance. I asked him to call the third tip in which he kept all 9 of the squires dancing without a breakdown through both patter and singing call. I spent the rest of the night trying to do the same without success.
On the way home I mentioned my failure and he said, "I noticed but you're not a sight caller." We stayed up the rest of the night while he introduced me to both the method and value of sight calling. Primarily, he said, when you see dancers having trouble you have to finish the routine you are calling. When I see trouble I change the next call. He could do that and still keep the timing and flow flawless. A couple of years later Al Brundage and Earl Johnson hired him to do an extra week at their caller school primarily so they could learn how to sight call."
You can also read a short obituary here.
Item Relations
| This Item | is related to | Item: Deuce Williams - teaching Curlique |
| Item: Deuce Williams - business card | is related to | This Item |
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Jim Mayo writes: "Deuce Williams was one of the early and quite possibly the best of, "sight" callers. He lived in Michigan and traveled quite a bit in the late 1960's and early 1970's. I hired him to share dances with me and he often stayed with us. One memorable event that I have told about often was the night in the early 1970's when he was staying with us and came with me to my Monday night club dance. I asked him to call the third tip in which he kept all 9 of the squires dancing without a breakdown through both patter and singing call. I spent the rest of the night trying to do the same without success.
On the way home I mentioned my failure and he said, "I noticed but you're not a sight caller." We stayed up the rest of the night while he introduced me to both the method and value of sight calling. Primarily, he said, when you see dancers having trouble you have to finish the routine you are calling. When I see trouble I change the next call. He could do that and still keep the timing and flow flawless. A couple of years later Al Brundage and Earl Johnson hired him to do an extra week at their caller school primarily so they could learn how to sight call."
You can also read a short obituary here.