ICPL Teens

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• Published:November 4th, 2009
• Comments:2 Comments
• Topic:Iowa Cityness, Try It

Hey everybody,

I wanted to tell you guys about the English Country dancing and Contra dances that happen in Iowa City. They are both located at the Iowa City Senior Center ,28 S Linn St downtown Iowa City. Here is a little history of English Country dancing. As far as we can tell it started in the 16th century close to the reign of Elizabeth 1. The county folk were the usual people to be doing this kind of dancing and every once in a while the queen would observe these dances.Here people dress pretty casually for English country dances. These dances are the first Saturday of every month at 7:30 or 8:00 depending on if you wish to go to the beginners class. For these dances there is no admission fee but it is appreciated to bring a few dollars as a donation to the live band to help them out since they aren’t getting payed to play.

This is English country dancing in the ballroom at the Old Capital building. This room was really pretty and fun to dance in.

The other kind of dances that are held are contra dances. The spirit of these dances are a little more upbeat and they are quicker paced. These dances are partner dances where you and your partner are grouped with one more set of partners. Or they are mixers where you dance for part of the dance with almost each person. These dances are held the third Saturday of each month at 7:30 or 8:00 depending on if you wish to go to the beginners class and the admission is 5 dollars for everyone over sixteen, under sixteen is free.

Contra dancing at the Senior center.

Contra dancing both pictures are from the same day.

I have been going to these dances for about a year and I got so into it that I was part of the renaissance faire dance troop it is a blast. Even if you haven’t ever done either of these kinds of dancing you will be able to catch on easily because from 7:30 until 8 both Saturdays there are beginners classes where you will learn most of the moves you need for the dances. If you do decide to come use the Linn St. entrance that is up the big stairs.

I’m looking forward to hopefully seeing some new faces there.