2023 Dance Callers for Bundanoon DanceFest

Paul & Leslie Carr

Paul and Leslie have been dancing Irish Sets since 2007.  They run a successful display group, Set In Their Ways, in Canberra. They are in demand as teachers at festivals around Australia and have run workshops at the National Folk Festival, Irish and Celtic Music Festival in Yass, The Turning Wave Festival, Kangaroo Valley Folk Festival, Cobargo Folk Festival, Majors Creek Festival, Trentham Set Dancing Weekend, Comhaltas Melbourne Set Dancing Weekend, and of course Bundanoon DanceFest.
Paul has choreographed a number of his own sets, with help from the Set In Their Ways dancers.  Three of these sets have been published in the excellent series of books on Set Dancing written by Pat Murphy. These dances have been taught and displayed in Ireland, Europe and Australia.

Irish Set Dance with a splash of Italian - The Rimini Set

David Potter

Roger & Christine Gifford

Roger and Christine will present Nordic dances. Roger has been folk dancing for over 60 years.  Christine for about 25 years. Together they have convened and taught Nordic dances in Canberra's sCanDans group for over 20 years. Roger is also a Contra caller.

Popular Nordic Folk Dances

Keith Wood

Keith Wood has been calling dances for several years, usually in Contra and English Country styles, at regular dance workshops in Sydney. He also composes dances in these styles and in Australian and Scottish Country styles and has published four books of his dances so far.

Contras Volume 4

Modern English

Madis & Tiina Alvre

Madis Alvre commenced dancing in 1961 and instructed the Sydney Estonian folk dancers 'Virmalised - Northern Lights' for 33 years, until 2014. He has organised, choreographed and directed performances for Folkloric Festivals and the National Folk Festial, and has directed major folk dancing events at Estonian cultural festivals in Australia. Madis and his wife Tiina have danced together since 2000 and have led folk and social dance workshops at the National Folk Festival, Kangaroo Valley Folk Festival and Bundanoon DanceFest.

Estonian Folk and Social Dance Workshop

Norm Ellis

Norm began dancing during the 'hey-day' of the Bush Bands in the '70s. A past leader of Melbourne's Colonial Dancers, co-founder of the TSDAV, Norm still enjoys dancing, calling and teaching, occasionally devising a new dance, and adapting dances to suit the occasion.
Norm will teach a selection of dances he has adopted from various sources, and you may discover that 'squares' are not always for 4 couples.

More Fun with Squares

Margaret & Bill Winnett

Margaret and Bill Winnett have danced together since 1964. Margaret has been a traditional step dancer since 1957 and a Ceili dancer since 1959. Bill joined the Sydney Irish Ceili Dancers in 1965 and together they have an extensive range of dances which they have been teaching for decades.

A Selection of Traditional Irish Dances

Caroline & Duncan Barrell

Caroline runs, with partner Duncan, the Blue Mountains Heritage dance group teaching bush and social dancing for fun on Wednesday evenings. English country dance and Contra are included also.

Blue Mountains Favourites

Arthur Kingsland

Arthur teaches a wide variety of dance genres both modern & traditional, including Australian Contemporary and Colonial, Irish Set dancing, English Country, Scottish Country and American Contra dancing. He is “notorious” for interesting variations and challenging dances, and writing challenging dances in a similar vein.

The Newcastle Challenge

American composers of English Country Dance

Colin Towns

Pat Shaw workshop:

Pat Shaw (1917-1977) was a very prolific dance composer in English, American, Dutch, Welsh and other styles.  Most of the dances have a “Shawism” which lift his dances into interesting and/or challenging dances.   While familiarisation with his dances helps, Colin has developed method and approach to teaching these dances so that most people can participate and achieve.

Chocolate Ball workshop:

In 1995 the annual Ball in Edinburgh contained not just 1 or 2 but the whole program of dances to tunes composed by Purcell.  This contained the Kit Cat Club which drove my imagination to compose a program of dances named for Chocolate or desserts, to music in Purcell style, played by an electric string quartet.  Finally the NFF accepted this at NFF2023, and it is good enough to repeat.

A Chocolate Ball

Pat Shaw's Pinewoods Collection

Anthony Northey

Tony is a well known teacher of Scottish Country dancing having travelled and taught widely.  He has called at many a Ceilidh and Festival being a regular performer at the National Folk Festival since 1992.

Dancing with a Scottish Flavour

Bruce Lemin

I've been dancing for over 45 and hold Oscars (the highest competency awards in Ballroom Dancing) in both Modern/Standard and New Vogue categories. I have considerable experience in teaching Ballroom Dancing, and also in teaching and calling Bush Dances. I have taught New Vogue/Ballroom Dancing workshops at Bundanoon every year but one.

Best of Ballroom at Bundanoon

Jim Williams

Jim has been sharing his knowledge of Bavarian dancing for over 20 years. Jim lived and learned the dancing of Bavaria for 10 years and has since  visited many times and attended dance festivals and brought back new dances.

Dances from other countries danced in Bavaria

Katherine Tammaro

Ever since joining the Earthly Delights Historic Dance Academy in 2017 I have been hooked on dancing and teaching dancing.  Since then, I have become President of a new dance group, Historic Dance Delights, which focusses on bringing social dances and displays to the wider community. 

A Caper Through Bordonian Dances

Cathy Grylls

Cathy's been attending dances and workshops since before she was born, and is now ready to continue the tradition with her own little one.

A for Alexandra

Peter Foster

Some of Peter's Dances