Did You Know? - Music for Social Dancing
The Vermont Folklife Archive is full of amazing first-person accounts of everyday life in Vermont and New England—past and present. In “Did You Know?” we share these stories with you. This month, we bring you the final installment of a four-part series featuring music in our collections. (You can check out our earlier episodes: Songs of Loss and Longing; Communities of Song; and Music of Childhood.)
This month, we feature Music for Social Dancing. Social dancing – here including everything from square and contra dancing to ballroom dancing and Finnish waltzing – has played an important role in people's lives in New England for hundreds of years. In this month's “Did You Know?” we share archival recordings of four different musicians who provided music for social dancing here in Vermont across the 20th century.
Weed's Imperial Orchestra.
Sterling Weed
Sterling Weed was a much-loved performer, band leader and music teacher in northwestern Vermont active from 1911 through the early 2000s. When he died at age 104, he was the oldest known active band leader in the nation. As a member of Sault’s Orchestra and Weed's Imperial Orchestra he played in venues across southern Quebec and northern Vermont, including the inaugural balls for three governors. For many years Weed’s Imperial Orchestra was the Sunday house band on the Lake Champlain steamship Ticonderoga. Weed taught music to over 4,000 students at schools in St. Albans, Fairfax, Enosburg, Franklin, Milton and Swanton. This recording comes from a 1947 performance at the Jesse Welden Inn in St. Albans, and features Weed's Imperial Orchestra playing the popular Jimmy McHugh and Johnny Mercer number, "The Bad Humor Man."
Our next musician, Arvid Kalinen, is the son of Finnish immigrants to Vermont. His parents came first to Fitchburg, Massachusetts, then on to Andover, Vermont, where they bought a farm and raised 9 children. Music and dance were an important part of life in Vermont’s Finnish community, and Arvid grew up going to social dances at the local Finnish dance hall. In 1992 he sat for an interview with VT Folklife researcher, Greg Sharrow where he played his button accordion and talked about the different types of social dance tunes he performs. His wife, Helvi, joins in the conversation with Greg.
Arvid: This is the piece that you have to play exactly like you can't dance it otherwise. [plays]
Greg: Boy, that has a nice swing to it!
Arvid: There's a beautiful Finnish waltz that I play. [plays]
Helvi: He only plays by ear.
Arvid: I don't play by music at all, it's by memory.
Greg: And so, how'd you learn these songs?
Arvid: I listen to a tape recorder.
Greg: Did you learn to play this instrument when you were a kid?
Arvid: Well, pick on it, not this one but others.
Greg: So, you were playing years ago then as well.
Helvi: I think all his brothers did some.
Arvid: Now the schottische is a different type of music. [plays] Now that's in Key of C. Now in Key of G. [plays]
Greg: Did you play for dances back in the days when there were dances around here?
Arvid: I never did, but I have played for people that dance. We got a big deck here, one night a whole bunch of us, we got together.
Helvi: The kids gave him his birthday party last June. You played at that.
Arvid: Ya, I played at my birthday party in the town hall in Andover. About 100 people there.
Helvi: Next night, because our daughters were still home, we had a dance on the deck the next night, but with a tape player.
Arvid: That's a nice little instrument.
Harold Luce and fiddle students
Fiddler and dance caller Harold Luce of Chelsea, VT first learned to play watching the legendary Vermont fiddler Ed Larkin. Harold, or “Chuck” as his friends called him, was a long-time member of the Ed Larkin Contra Dancers and performed with them at the New York World’s Fair in 1939 and 1964. Throughout his life Harold mentored many young performers, including five years as a participant in VT Folklife's Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program. In a 1994 interview with Good Citizen Magazine, he noted that he had at that time "played his fiddle at 501 places with at least 483 musicians and 89 piano players." In 2004, he was recognized with the Governor's Heritage Award. Here, he is accompanied on piano by Karl Brown, playing "Raggedy Andy," also known as “Ragtime Annie.” This tune was a common one played at square and contra dances in Vermont over the years.
VT Folklife's collection of field recordings created by Vermont folk singer Margaret MacArthur between 1960-1968 documents a wide range of vocal music in and around the state. Among the ballads and folk songs in the collection are a handful of recordings of songs people remembered from childhood, including a number of “play party” songs: children’s game songs that involve music and accompanying gestures and movements. Think songs like “London Bridge.” One wonderful example recorded by Margaret comes from Charles Graves of Sunderland, Vermont – a play party song called “The Needle’s Eye.” Charles shared that they "often played these [singing] games at the Sunderland Community Church."
Well, the Needle's Eye: they'd take hold of hands and form a circle around the room and then one or two couples would form an arch over the other two—over the ring. Then as they go around and round, walk around under those arches, they sing that air:
[singing]
The needle's eye that dost supply the thread that runs so truly
It has caught many a smiling lass and now it has caught you
It has caught one, it has caught two
And many a beau have I let go because I wanted you.
These four excerpts are a small part of the larger body of music that resides in VT Folklife's Archival collections. You can find out more about the music in these collections by visiting the Archives webpage and exploring our digital archive or by searching the website under the word "music."