End of the dance season for another year…..never a happy time for us but what better place to finish 2015 than the magnificent church of St Chad’s in the heart of Shrewsbury for their wonderful Christmas Tree Festival.
Some interesting parking problems (well it’s Christmas, there was a Christmas Fair across the road and it was chucking it down with rain) had a few of us, as well as the management of the church a little worried that we might not kick off on time but we did and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
Dressed in a variety of Christmas finery the team went through a good chunk of our repertoire and, I think gave a lot of pleasure to the watching audience.
Our traditional final event is always Carols Around the Tree at the home of our leaders, Ray and Bev and we’re all looking forward to that.
Shrewsbury Morris do a Woore Dance…
In our penultimate dance out of the year, we made our various ways on Thursday to Woore Victory Hall, on the Shopshire/Cheshire/Staffordshire borders.
We were dancing for Woore WI – which means that we were doing our ‘show’ – an hour long showcase that features a number of our favourite dances, along with some singing and explanations of Morris in general and our own dances in particular. The Roving Mic often makes an appearance too, as we interview both members of the team and of the audience!
Nice to be inside and dancing on a decent floor (much more forgiving on the feet) and just look at the height our chaps can get while dancing Shrewsbury Gallop!
Normally we love a WI, as we are renowned as a cake loving side, but sadly this time we were out of luck as they’d eaten all the cake before we got there! But we had a good time anyway…
Shrewsbury Morris Bid for Festive No. 1
In a bold festive move, in no way influenced by any Christmas Spirit, we have ventured onto Soundcloud!
We would love you to listen to our Ceilidh band playing I Saw Three Ships from our traditional Christmas Ceilidh on December 5th. This wonderful event pulls crowds in from miles around, with people coming back year after year and also featuring the famous running raffle…
We always have a theme for for the ceilidh, this year’s was Magic. Most of the side and a fair amount of the audience turn up in fancy dress – this year we had Gandalf, Maleficent and Freddie Mercury (well, it is a kind of magic…)
On the track, you can hear the dancers having a great time to the accomplished calling of Bev Langton.
We also always do a ‘spot’ in the interval. This year, we surprised the audience with a christmas medley from the Shrewsbury Morris Spoonchestra!
Christmas Ceilidh Now Booking!
Shrewsbury Morris – 2015 dance season continues, and we’re recruiting!!!!
Since we last blogged a great deal has happened in Shrewsbury Morris World so by way of an update……..since the end of May we’ve danced at Chester Folk Festival (scene of the great rainbow neckerchief tussle), received, used and handed over the Shrewsbury Festivals Baton and organised and held an amazing, highly popular free music and dance event in town called Beat and Bells.
This saw Pateley Longsword Morris, us (naturally), the awesomely thunderous Kayobi Taiko and the stupendous Zulu Tradition who wowed the crowds that gathered in Shrewsbury Square on a sunny June day….a day to live long in the memory!
Prior to the event we had also raised enough money through a Crowdfunding project (we believe we’re the first Morris side ever to achieve this) to allow Zulu Tradition to visit six local schools in the week leading up to Beat and Bells and impart their own particular brand of education, fun, song and dance to completely captivated children of all ages. The photos of young beaming faces joining joyfully in all the activities were proof enough that the idea was a complete success.
The sunshine and heat of Sat June 6th was replaced by the cold and rain of Sat June 13th when we went to dance in Wellington for the annual Summer Fayre. This delightful event is a bit of a favourite of ours and we were really looking forward to it. Sadly the rain curtailed our dance programme but both our teams put in a stoic spot before the heavens really opened and the whole event was moved indoors. Our cloggers did manage a dance inside a packed school room which went down very well with the crafters there!
Two weeks later we were back dancing at Holly Farm Nurseries near Prees for their open day. We weaved in and out of the vintage cars, plants and flowerpots to put on a pretty good display and the team all seemed to have great fun on another rainy day….but we danced under a lovely canopy so that was alright then!
July started with a social event…an unwedding….as two of our super team members, Cathy and John got unmarried at a very lovely unwedding reception…..a fab day where the team could enjoy being together and saying well done to the happy newly unweds! Needless to say there was a Lasses dance in there which Cathy had to join in with and an appearance by a secretive and previously unknown “boy” band who we believe will slip just as quickly back to well deserved obscurity.
The village of Llanrhaedr Ym Mochnant kindly invited us to process and dance at their very popular carnival on 11th July and a week later we found ourselves in Buxton as guests of the very hyphenated but extremely well organised and kind Chapel-en-le-Frith Morrismen who were celebrating a birthday by hosting 16 Morris sides from around the country for a Day of Dance. The weather was brilliant, the dance venues spectacular, the organisation impeccable and it was really nice to meet and dance with friends old and new.
Just before we broke up for our traditional August mini-break, local torn paper collage artist Lyn Evans came to give us a preview of her latest commission which is a beautiful collage of Shrewsbury Square. Known to only a few of us at the time she had very kindly included Shrewsbury Morris in her picture. Not just included but centre stage too! We are extremely grateful to her for “immortalising” us in such a beautiful way and for being so generous as to give each team member some gifts of cards and vouchers to buy full size prints. A great way to end the first part of our dance season.
Although August is a quiet month dance-wise for us, many of the team have been and are currently very busy helping and working at other folk festivals, principally Sidmouth and Towersey where a great deal of hard work and organisation is helping those two festivals enormously.
Whilst they’re doing that the rest of us move on to our own folk festival in Shrewsbury where we’ll be dancing on Sat 29th Aug at the following places:
Festival Site Garden Stage – 9:45-10:30
St Mary’s Church – 11:15-12:00
St Alkmond’s Church – 12:15-13:00
Procession through town – 13:13-14:00
Shrewsbury Square – 14:45-15:30
St Alkmond’s Church – 15:45-16:30
We are looking forward to it immensely.
Finally, practice resumes on Thursday 3rd September at Sundorne School, Shrewsbury from 8pm……..and we’re recruiting, especially men! So, if you’re even vaguely fit, like fun, feel like having a go at this wonderful thing that we all love and don’t mind committing some of your free time then why not just come to one of our practices, meet the team and see what you think? We’ll teach you everything so no previous dance experience is necessary.
You never know…….we could change your life for you…..:)))))
2015 so far
It’s been a very busy and pretty varied start to the 2015 dance season for us, kicking off as ever with our annual Team Walking Weekend in a part of the UK. This time our terrific organisers Sue and Steve (hats off and hankies lowered to them) really came up with the goods and booked us into the Youth Hostel in Conwy, Wales. We enjoyed perfect weather, a hostel completely to ourselves with acres of room, a super music session during which we actually danced off against each other and, of course enjoyed a wonderful walk together.
The weekend was made even more special because we had also just reached (in fact surpassed) the £2k target we had set ourselves via a Crowdfunder project, to get the amazing Zulu Tradition group from KwaZulu Natal to visit six local schools to carry out cultural workshops. Double celebration with champagne!!! Looking forward to that happening in June. The Crowdfunder experience was a new one to us, it turned out to be a bit of a rollercoaster ride but thanks to some hugely generous people we made it with two weeks to spare!
On our return we were quickly into the first dance out of 2015, at the very picturesque Glansevern Gardens, close to Welshpool. This enables us to demonstrate several new dances that had been hard practised over the winter and at our “Boot Camps” in January. Although a little on the inclement side the weather brightened just as we started and remained sunny all through our programme – good start!
This was swiftly followed by a highly enjoyable (albeit with an unfortunate casualty…get well asap Lynne) dance out in Shrewsbury for and with The Big Busk, a now annual event to commemorate through music, dance and all manner of entertainment, the life of a local busker Ben Bebbington who was murdered by two men on a canal towpath comparatively recently. The Busk fills Shrewsbury town centre with music and fun and is great to be a part of. We had a super time dancing in front of big crowds and caught up with lots of friends too. Note to selves….don’t dance Steeple Claydon in a space the size of a handkerchief again :)))
Next stop….celebrating May Day at the fabulous National Trust Dudmaston near Bridgnorth, in front of what turned out to be (I believe) their biggest crowd ever for a single day! Some of us were on a beach on the other side of the world that day so couldn’t be there but the team (as always) had a great time, danced brilliantly and were thoroughly well looked after by the NT staff as always. We love going to Dudmaston :)))
Our most recent dance out was at the outgoing Mayor of Shrewsbury’s Garden Party in the tiny village of Cruckmeole just outside Shrewsbury. After an impromptu and unexpected maypole dance by myself and Cathy (knew we should have arrived later lol) the team danced for the party goers on the tennis court of a beautiful country house, finishing with perfect timing so that the duck race could start.
We have a busy few days coming as we are dancing at Chester Festival on Sat 23rd May and then the following Wednesday (27th) when we’re dancing before the Demon Barbers XL show at The Place theatre in Oakengates, Telford all of which we are very much looking forward to.
Beat and Bells Dance Programme
Wondering when all our great dance and drum teams are on in Shrewsbury Square on June 6th?
Beat & Bells in schools!
Beat and Bells
The rhythms of the world will be sounding in Shrewsbury this summer, when prizewinning local morris side, Shrewsbury Morris (that’s us!), host an exciting range of dancers and drummers from across the globe for a day of ‘Beat & Bells’.
Zulu Tradition will be coming all the way from KwaZulu Natal in South Africa to headline the event. This young group of Zulu singers and dancers will bring a heady mix of African harmonies and high-energy, athletic dance, all traditionally costumed and with exciting drum-rhythms. They have performed at Buckingham Palace and the British Museum for Mandela Day and are in demand for events around the world.
They will be joined by Kayobi Taiko, experts in the dynamic and ancient art of Japanese taiko drumming. Kayobi have performed in festivals around the country over the last few years, making a truly awesome sound.
Pateley Longsword are a stunning group of longsword morris folk dancers from Yorkshire. They are renowned for giving audiences tradition with attitude, bringing a real vitality and freshness to their dancing. Many of their dances feature longswords, as their name suggests, bringing a thrilling flash of steel to their daring performances.
The line up is completed by performances from Shrewsbury Bull and Pump Morris, Shrewsbury Cloggers and The Shrewsbury Lasses who, between them, bring an exceptional range of traditional dances from around Britain, as well as many newer dances they have choreographed themselves and taught around the country. A familiar sight around Shropshire, they have been performing for nearly 40 years and Shrewsbury Morris expect to carry on proudly dancing in Shrewsbury for plenty more years too.
This is the third annual free day of music and dance Shrewsbury Morris has organized for the town and this promises to be as lively and colourful as our previous events.
‘Beat & Bells’ is in The Square in Shrewsbury on 6 June from 10 until 4pm, and in the evening why not come along to our Summer Ceilidh, held jointly with Squeezing Shropshire – all the details are here!
An Exciting Time to be a Shrewsbury Morris Dancer
We don’t often blow our own trumpet (well…..not very often anyway) but right now is a very exciting time to be a member of Shrewsbury Morris. If Ray and Bev are reading this then of course it’s always an exciting time to be a member of Shrewsbury Morris! :))
So far 2014 has been a very good year. We’ve danced in great locations around Shropshire, visited the Lake District for The Morris Federation Day of Dance, enjoyed our traditional walking weekend, had lovely articles written about us in the local press, won several social media awards, danced in a pantomime, taught new members, increased the size of our team, hosted a major Drum, Music and Dance event in our own town, danced for charity, danced AND worked simultaneously at two major UK folk festivals, been sponsored for the first time, judged competitions, supported local business, hosted two Open Evenings and been invited to dance for Parliament…….and I haven’t even mentioned Christmas yet…..it’s coming though!!
Our most recent dance out at beautiful National Trust Dudmaston, for their Orchard Day was a great success, attended by a lot of team members which was great because everyone could get a chance to dance but, over three 45 minute dance spots, so could people get a chance to rest between dances (the advantage of having a big “squad” to use Premier League parlance :))
We were watched at each spot by a very enthusiastic and appreciative crowd and, as usual attracted some very lovely comments. Halfway through the afternoon we were asked to judge the produce competition, during which we were interviewed by our friends at BBC Radio Shropshire. With our “GBBO” heads on (yeah right!) we judged apple pies, chutney, apple cake, sponges and also decorated apples (well it WAS Orchard Day!) What a Morris Dancer knows about cake judging you could write down on the back of a very small postage stamp but it was done, we got out safely, it was a lot of fun and it got us a massive shout out on local radio so…..result!
So, to the present moment. As I type, the team has just finished hosting what we think were two very successful Open Evenings attended by some 16 new people overall. We hope, and think that a good proportion of them will come back and join us as most of them seemed to enjoy the events and the hospitality. If you’re reading this, and think it’s too late…it isn’t. Just give us a call and ask to come along to one of our practices on a Thursday night from 8pm at Sundorne School, Shrewsbury. We’d love to see you.
We are back at practice now with a vengeance as we are looking forward to (hopefully) dancing for Parliament on Monday December 8th. This follows a very kind invitation from our local MP Daniel Kawczynski who is keen to host us there. The team is very excited about this chance to represent Shropshire Morris Dancing and looking forward to it immensely. Details are still being finalised but we’ll publish further news about this wonderful opportunity on here, our FB page and our twitter account.
Just prior to that however, we have a busy weekend because on Sat Dec 6th we are holding our annual Christmas Ceilidh at Sundorne School, Shrewsbury from 8pm. As always, there is a fancy dress theme and this year it’s Frost and Fire, so plenty of dressing up opportunities, although it’s not compulsory!
This is always a really fun event, there is a terrific band (Pump Action), some great calling from Bev Langton and is always well attended so book early. There’s currently an Early Bird offer of only £6.00 per ticket which represents tremendous value we think, so call the number on the poster attached and book early for a great fun evening. But be quick because the Early Bird offer ends on 31st October.
So there you are, we’re approaching 2015 at breakneck pace, are excitedly expecting our new dancers, are planning another big event to host next year in Shrewsbury, we’re constantly raising our profile in many different ways, are looking forward to new sponsorship from local business and working towards 2016 when we will celebrate our 40th birthday :)))))
So you see, it really is an exciting time to be a Shrewsbury Morris Dancer!! Call us, it could be you enjoying the bright future with us! Beware, you might need shades though :)))