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

Browse Items (46 total)

  • Tags: Tony Parkes
Document

Patter Calling - origins

Patter calling is a style of square dance calling in which the caller speaks the words or chants them on a musical pitch, hopefully in harmony with the tune. The classic form of patter is rhyming… View item
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Lazy H - Tony Parkes

Tony Parkes is calling Ed Gilmore's classic dance, the Lazy H. As the dance progresses, Tony adds variations so that instead of couples doing a right and left through around a standing line of four,… View item
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Two Little Right Hand Stars - Tony Parkes

This dance appeared in Ralph Page's Northern Junket in Volume 1, #2, p. 17. This clip includes Tony's walkthrough of the dance.The dance is attributed to Ralph Page. Tony is using Rod Linnell's… View item
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Forward Five - Tony Parkes

The dance is based on one used by Ralph Page. Tony's shortened version goes as follows: A1 All go forward and back Go forward again, gent #1 bring two ladies home A2 At the heads, go… View item
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Dick Leger figure - Tony Parkes

Tony Parkes calls a quadrille-style figure that he learned from the calling of Dick Leger. Leger did it as a singing call to the tune of "Wolverton Mountain," a country song made famous by… View item
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Gents and Corners - Tony Parkes

Danced during a Retrospective session at the Ralph Page Dance Legacy Weekend, January 15, 2011. The caller is Tony Parkes; musicians are Randy Miller, fiddle; Peter Siegel, mandolin; and Bob… View item
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Box the Gnat - a short history

Box the Gnat - a short historyby Tony ParkesNobody seems to know when "box the gnat" took on the standardized meaning it has today inrecreational square and contra dancing. In Instant Hash (1962),… View item
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Just Because - Walter Lenk

Caller Walter Lenk, backed up by Tony Parkes, leads dancers through the singing square Just Because. Recorded at the Saturday night Grand Dance, January 1988, at the first Ralph Page Dance Legacy… View item
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Do-Si-Do and Face the Sides - Tony Parkes

Tony Parkes is the caller in this excerpt of a Ted Sannella composition, "Do-Si-Do and Face the Sides." The dance, at the Kingston, New Hampshire town hall on the evening of November 18,… View item
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The Route - Tony Parkes

The caller is Tony Parkes; musicians are Yankee Ingenuity (Jack O'Connor, mandolin; Mary Lea, fiddle; Cal Howard, bass; Peter Barnes, piano), joined by Steve Hickman, fiddle and harmonica. Filmed… View item
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Darling Nellie Gray - Tony Parkes

This clip shows two versions of the dance, the traditional version called by Ralph Page as his usual ending dance and a variation by Maine caller Rod Linnell called "Atomic Nellie Gray." A… View item
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Darling Nellie Gray walkthrough - Tony Parkes

Ralph Page's usual ending dance was Darling Nellie Gray. Here, Tony Parkes teaches that traditional dance as well as a variation by Rod Linnell called "Atomic Nellie Gray"; Tony… View item