VANCOUVER MORRIS MEN

Welsh Border Dances

• The Silurian Morris Men of Ledbury, Herefordshire
  The Silurian men are the only Morris Ring side to concentrate solely on Welsh Border Morris, which they have done since 1979. They were formed in 1969, and initially performed mainly Cotswold dances with the occasional Welsh Border dance thrown in. In 1979, due to fact that members Dave Jones and Keith Francis had unearthed several more Border dances, Silurian changed their kit, blacked up and converted to Welsh Border exclusively.

• Old Wonder Not for Joes of Putley Mill, Herefordshire
  Old Wonder Not for Joes were formed in 1988 by Dave Jones when he left Silurian due to an internal "change of management" decision. In 1986, Dave Jones had discovered an old Pershore dancer, Bill Scarrott, from whom he had collected sufficient information to assemble a suite of Pershore dances. These were the dances on which Old Wonder concentrated. Bill Scarrott died in 1986, shortly after Dave Jones met him. Dave Jones died in 1991. Following Jones's death, Old Wonder effectively disbanded.

• "The Roots of Welsh Border Morris" by Dave Jones
  This booklet, published in 1990, contains many of Daves Jones's Border Morris notes.

• The Morris Ring archives
  These archives contain hundreds of pages of historic information on Welsh Border morris, including newspaper clippings and instructional details by (amongst others) Cecil Sharp, Russel Wortley, Geoff Mendham, Ella Mary Leather, Lionel Bacon, E.C. Cawte, Lavender Jones, Maud Karpeles, P. Davenport, John Kirkpatrick, Roy Dommett, Jack Hargreaves and Dave Jones. However, at the time of review by the VMM, Jones's notes from his meetings with Scarrott had not been included.

THE DANCES

Please see The Pershore Morris (PDF format) - a 1999 article on the morris from Pershore, Worcestershire, written by Graham Baldwin for the American Morris Newsletter.

We are particularly proud of our own dance, "After the Ball is Over". This dance was assembled from snippets of dance moves and tunes gleaned from Dave Jones' notes and cassette recordings made during his interviews with Bill Scarrott. Many thanks to Dave's widow, Annie, for letting snuffman Jonesey and Graham Baldwin go through Dave's files during the summer of '99, and to our 1999-2000 season Border Instructor, Innis Pencarrick, who put it all together to create a great dance with a real traditional "feel".

We have been further influenced by the comments of George Collins and Sam Dufty (of Pershore, Worcs.) who we met on our 2001 England Tour and, as kids in the 20's, used to follow the Pershore Not-for-Joes around the town.

• The Herefordshire Dances
  • Brimfield
  • Dilwyn
  • Colwall Change Set (a Silurian original, based on Upton figures)
  • Black Ladies Aston (a Silurian original, based on White Ladies Aston figures)
• The Gloucestershire Dances
  • Bromsberrow Heath
• The Worcestershire Dances
  • Evesham
  • Pershore
    • Girl With the Blue Dress On
    • Black Boy
    • John Peel
    • The Ash Grove
    • Monkey Cocked his Tail Up
    • Sailor's Polka
    • The Handkerchief Dance
    • After the Ball is Over
  • White Ladies Aston
  • Upton-on-Severn
    • The Stick Dance
    • The Handkerchief Dance
• The Shropshire Dances
  • Much Wenlock
  • Cleehill