Do-Si-Do ’Til Dawn

Last Saturday night, Elm Street remained quiet as few dared to venture out into the arctic air, but inside the Union Unitarian church Exeter students and community members kept warm by contra dancing the night away. The Exeter Contra Dance Club coordinated with the Union Unitarian church to allow students to participate in an evening of dancing without the pressure of suits and dazzling dresses.Dancers lined up across from each other following the Caller’s instructions. The Caller explains each dance before the song begins and calls out different moves during the dance. Upper Jonas Eichenlaub, an experienced contra dancer, noted that “really good dancers add so many more moves in between the moves the Caller calls” and said that he is trying to learn those flourishes. Eichenlaub spent the night “attempting to master this one twirl where, to end the swing, [he reaches his] hand behind [his] partner’s back and [spins] her around.”

“I felt a great sense of nostalgia during the whole dance as I contemplated where that time had gone.”

Although there were experienced dancers in attendance, for many this was their first time at a contra. Despite new dancers fumbling through certain moves, senior Webb Harrington said that “everyone was supportive of each other’s mistakes” and that it made the night into an experience where everyone was “smiling or laughing nearly the whole three hours.”Eichenlaub agreed that the acceptance of new dancers is a defining feature of contras, and he has “always found the fact that they teach every dance before each dance to be one of the best parts of contra-ing.” The willingness to teach dances “allows people who are showing up to a contra dance for the first time to jump in,” Eichenlaub said.“Do-Si-Do!” the Caller yelled out. The crowd moved back and forth listening to the instructions. Experienced dancers smoothly moved across the dance floor while students experiencing a contra for the first time laughed and bumbled through the moves. Prep Briana Turner spent the night learning the ways of contra for the first time. “Usually all you have to do is have fun and let others lead you through the dance,” she said. Contra requires partner changes and synchronized dancing, meaning the more dancers, the better. Turner said, “I would highly recommend others coming too, it’s really fun.”Unlike other Exeter dances, contra has an informal dress code and a low pressure atmosphere in comparison to dances such as Winter Formal or Phish Fest. Turner enjoyed the contra environment because “it lacks the stress of other dances where you’re afraid to mess up,” she said. “When I mess up [at a contra], I usually don’t mind since there are others of all ages and genders messing up or helping others.”Harrington said, “The atmosphere was much more excited and personable than in most dances at Exeter.” He believes traditional Exeter dances “tend to be anonymous and crowded with hot sweaty teenagers trying to pretend to be cool with the all-too-loud music,” but that contra had a pleasantly different, more accepting mood.The presence of community members also distinguished the contra dance. Postgraduate Hebe Hilhorst felt it was “nice to have the wider Exeter community there—we had quite a few of the older generation—because it gave us a short time outside of the Exeter bubble.” In addition to members of the community, the band Stone Soup performed during the dance. “The band had a sense of humor when it opened up into the Star Wars bar song and main theme song,” Harrington said.Though not as big as typical Exeter dances, the intimate setting allowed students to have an evening of letting go and dancing without feeling self-conscious about their dance moves. Hilhorst said, “It would be great if it were every weekend, or every two weekends, instead of once a month. It’s a great way to meet people and dance.”For Harrington, the evening brought senti mental feelings for times without the technology of strobe lights and disc jockeys of current-day dances. “The dancing took me back to some place in time, where my family and ancestors might have gathered at a country dance to swing and keep the step-of-eight,” Harrington said. “I felt a great sense of nostalgia during the whole dance as I contemplated where that time had gone, then Alamandered to the left and was face-to-face with someone else.”