Sleepless Spirals

December 2005
Duple minor longways, improper
32 bars
Music: not settled

A1	All set to partner, turn single, and two-hand turn.
A2	All set to neighbor, turn single, and gypsy.
B1	Single file circle left (no hands) once around the minor set. Continue single file along the lines (women ahead of their neighbors).
B2	Women turn back over right shoulder & two-hand turn neighbor once and a half. Single file back along lines until each person is opposite partner.

Music: I've tried a number of tunes with this dance, including The Mulberry Garden (a leisurely jig) and Greensleeves played as a waltz. Naturally, the dance is different as a jig (with 32 bars containing two dancing beats each) or a waltz (with 32 bars of three dancing beats each). I think I like the waltz better, but it works either way.
What I like about this dance is the progression--the circulation along lines, changing places with neighbor, and returning to progressed place opposite partner. I was inspired by a contra dance that featured this progression. I remember that Nils Fredland called it at the Rochester Thanksgiving weekend festival, 2005, but I didn't remember the name of the contra dance. (Since then I learned that it is "Gang of Four" by the late, great Gene Hubert.) It occurred to me that it would be nice to put such a progression into an English style dance. This was the first of my own dances I dared to call in public.
The spirals in the title refer to the ever widening clockwise motion from the end of A2 through B1: turn single, gypsy, circle of four, and whole-set circulation. The sleepless part comes from an episode of insomnia during which I put the sequence together.
B1: The motion along the lines continues the clockwise motion of the circle of four. It is circulation in a large oval comprising the whole set, women in front of their neighbors, bending around the ends of the set.

Here is a contra dance version, with an English-style set and turn single.

A1	Ones balance & swing.
A2	All set to neighbor, turn single, and gypsy.
B1	Single file circle left (no hands) once around the minor set. Continue single file along the lines (circulating in a large oval, women ahead of their neighbors).
B2	Women turn back over right shoulder & swing neighbor. Single file back along lines until opposite partner.