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[strad]

A friend of mine has been asked to play at a single sex marriage reception and is scratching his head as to what tunes to play. Apart from The Gay Gordons can anyone suggest anything else? At band practice last night we didn't have many suggestions apart from De'il Stick The Minister.

Nigel

[george garside]

? ...the magic dragon

[Chris Ryall]

A friend of mine has been asked to play at a single sex marriage reception and is scratching his head as to what tunes to play. Apart from The Gay Gordons can anyone suggest anything else? At band practice last night we didn't have many suggestions apart from De'il Stick The Minister.
Nigel

As ever - depends on how he wants to play it (boys I assume?) There's nothing intrinsically wrong with the standard marriage set of 'Going upstairs', 'Dearest Dicke' etc  - you might omit 'Pram Pushing' in favour of 'Constant Billie'  

You could just do straightforward tunes without double entendre -  No fun in that though  

[edit]  Genius, George

[george garside]

bobby shafto

[Fangy]

Brighton Camp!

[Anahata]

A good few to choose from here:
http://folktunefinder.com/dosearch/?melody=&page=1&title=Gay

[Guy]

A friend of mine has been asked to play at a single sex marriage reception ...

Nigel

Perhaps it might be a good idea to establish with the people concerned as to whether they would find this sort of "double entendre" approach amusing, or whether they would find it unacceptable on what is, after all, their celebration! I've played at quite a few single-sex/Civil Ceremony/parnership do's, and find that they're as varied as any other type of event, so the usual repertoire goes down very well. If it's a ceilidh though, it does present the caller with some challenges, rather than their usual phrasing of introductions...."Men, Take your lady in a ballroom hold....ooh-err"  rang out of the speakers on one notable evening....

Cheers,
Guy

[Anahata]

If it's a ceilidh though, it does present the caller with some challenges, rather than their usual phrasing of introductions...."Men, Take your lady in a ballroom hold....ooh-err"

Some callers, famously Mary Panton, practice gender-neutral calling anyway so this never becomes a problem.

[Québécois]

Brighton Camp!

That one is also known as "The Girl I left behind"... ouch...

[Andrew Wigglesworth]

A friend of mine has been asked to play at a single sex marriage reception and is scratching his head as to what tunes to play. Apart from The Gay Gordons can anyone suggest anything else? At band practice last night we didn't have many suggestions apart from De'il Stick The Minister.

Nigel

Hmm, unless you intend to laboriously explain your "witty tune choices" each time I suspect it'll all be completely lost on the audience anyway ... and if you do ...

Why not just approach it as a normal wedding reception, after all, that's what it is these days, isn't it?

[seinegydd]

Diversity Singers, the Pink Singers, and the London Gay Men's Chorus had a "Scottish ceilidh" last Saturday at Cecil Sharp House (EFDSS headquarters in Camden Town). The band was Ka-foo-za-lum. Since the clientele was all gay, the caller had to find a way to teach us the dances without being sex-specific. Some couples were male-male, some were female-female, and some were mixed. At one point, I (male, gay) found myself taking the woman's role in one dance while my partner (female, lesbian) took the man's role. What the hell.

The dances we did were the sort of thing you'd find in any English barn dance. They may have been called "Highland Welcome" etc but they were just like the Circassian Circle etc. Everything had to be walked through, because most people didn't know the dances. But everyone had a good evening.

So just play as for any ordinary barn dance / community dance. Everyone will have an enjoyable time.

[Marje]

I think that for "gender neutral" calling to work, you'd need to be a bit selective with your dances. Some dances are quite differentiated in the requirements made of the men/women, and some moves, like Ladies' Chain, and anything entailing a ballroom hold, are quite difficult to do in reverse if you've never swapped roles before. If you just attempt a normal set of dances, some will really come unstuck if no one, even within a couple, knows who is the "man" and who are the "woman".

But there are plenty of dances in which the partners' moves are more or less mirroring each other, and these would be the ones to go for. Dashing White Sergeant and anything else with threesomes would work well, as the gender isn't usually important in those.

I'd recommend your friend to give that side of things a bit of thought and then worry about the tunes afterwards.

[Marje]

Oh, and a follow-up thought: another couple of snigger-worthy titles (and great tunes both) are Queen's Delight and Queen's Jig.

[george garside]

would "  the trip to the cottage" be suitable?

george

[Theo]

Rattling Roving Willie
Dick's Away
both from the William Dixon tune book of 1773

[sqwzboxstudent]

dick gossip?

[Andy Next Tune]

Cock of the North?
The Fairy Queen?

[Marje]

Oh, and surely "King of the Fairies".

[OwenG]

A friend of mine has been asked to play at a single sex marriage reception and is scratching his head as to what tunes to play.

If the reception was for a black couple would a similar thread be seen to be acceptable?

Hmph.

I'd take seinegydd's advice if I were you . . .

So just play as for any ordinary barn dance / community dance. Everyone will have an enjoyable time.

[Chris Brimley]

Nigel, seriously, I think this is one for the caller to sort out - if I were he/she, I think I would start the evening by bringing the issue into the open, and just explain what he/she normally does, and ask for advice from the audience as to how to sort it out.  The dancers, if they are mainly homosexual, will probaby be well used to ignorance and/or snidey comments, and will be looking to the caller for wise guidance, and will be highly impressed if the caller recognises it.  I think the best way to approach it would be for the caller to be up-front from the start, and maybe even joke about the traditional asssumption of heterosexuality in social dance.  I also think that if the caller were to avoid the huge pitfalls of jokiness, and also try not to get set on a PC but pedantic alternative convention for 'lady', 'gentleman', he/she might establish themself as a person to be really admired.   

I think the guiding priciple should be that the audience is usually right, whoever they may be.