Square Dance History Project
The rich story of North American square dance finally has a home in the digital age.

Revival Squares - video and web links

Creator: Janine Smith, Jim Saxe

Recent years have seen the appearance of a new audience for square dances. One important starting point was a series of dances in the Portland, Oregon, area, led by caller Bill Martin and the Foghorn Stringband. Those dances featured old-time southern Appalachian tunes and high-energy, simple dances, often big sets. A similar pattern has emerged in cities around the country, attracting enthusiastic young dancers. This list, initiated by Janine Smith and expanded by Jim Saxe, is by no means complete, but it does provide a video introduction to some of these new old-time square dances. Please send appropriate additions to this list; view the CONTACT tab for address.

One website that attempts to keep track of these kinds of square dances is here.

An excellent introduction to this scene is the five-minute documentary created by Doug Plummer, a profile of the Seattle Subversive Square Dance Society. Another video uses Dare To Be Square West in 2013 as a way to explore the expanding dance scene up and down the West Coast. Similarly, but with no video, you may enjoy a well-written and evocative story about the square dance revival in Knoxville, TN.

 

Dances are listed alphabetically by state.

 

CALIFORNIA: Arcata


CALIFORNIA: Los Angeles

 

CALIFORNIA: San Francisco Bay area

 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

IDAHO: Boise

 

INDIANA: Bloomington

 

KENTUCKY: Louisville

 
MARYLAND
Janine Smith and Susan Taylor perform as Too Hot Mamas, calling singing squares they have composed to contemporary music. They have videos on their YouTube channel.

MASSACHUSETTS: Jamaica Plain

 

MASSACHUSETTS: Montague

 

MICHIGAN: Detroit


MICHIGAN: Kalamazoo

 

MINNESOTA: Minneapolis

  • Monday Night Squares

  •  Square Dance on Wheels

  • Call & Answer

    Minneapolis based artist, Amanda Lovelee believes finding, preserving and constructing a space for physical connection is an urgent issue. As a society that faces the collapse of communities how do we continue to form face-to-face connections? The Call and Answer Project is about square dancing, hand-holding, and connecting.

NEW HAMPSHIRE
 NEW YORK: Ithaca


NEW YORK: New York City

 

NORTH CAROLINA: Durham

 

OREGON: Portland

Jim Saxe notes: A search on YouTube will also turn up a number of videos of square dancing at Portland's annual Old-Time Music Gathering.  (For searching purposes, note that video titles and descriptions might or might not include the word "Music" between "Old-Time" and "Gathering" and  that they might have "Old Time" or "Oldtime" instead of "Old-Time".)

TENNESSEE: Knoxville

 

TENNESSEE: Nashville


VIRGINIA: Charlottesville

 

VIRGINIA: Richmond


WASHINGTON: Seattle

Collection: Southern Appalachian
Subjects: General - Dance and Culture, Southern Appalachian - general
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Citation

Janine Smith, Jim Saxe, “Revival Squares - video and web links,” Square Dance History Project, accessed February 23, 2025, http://squaredancehistory.org/items/show/995.
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