Dances of the White Rats
The White Rats dance both the Cotswold and Border styles of Morris. The Cotswolds are in the English midlands, and the various styles are named after their "home" villages. A good deal of the dances are counted as traditional (no one knows who composed them, "we've always done it that way"), however quite a few dances have been written to a particular style in recent times. The Border style originated along the English/Welsh border. While there are traditional Border dances, many are relatively modern compositions.
Our Cotswold dances are in the styles done in the village of Adderbury, with a few from the village of Bampton. Many sides sing the traditional lyrics to their dances; we sing somewhat less-than-traditional lyrics (click on the dance to see the lyrics we sing). Our Border dances are mostly modern compositions, with one or two old ones thrown in.
Dance sources are indicated where we can blame someone, either for actually writing the dance or for leaving it laying around where someone else could pinch it.
Adderbury Dances
- Dances with hanks
- 17th of May (written by Tim Radford) (#)
- Tartan and Blue (written by Lee Thompson-Herbert, music is from the song "Put the Road in Order" on the Brass Monkey CD Going & Staying, which is in turn based on the song "The Buchan Turnpike")
- Strike the Bell (written by Lee Thompson-Herbert #, music is the sea chanty of the same name)
- The Adder (a Rat/Adderbury version of The Stork)
- Switches (an Ancient Rat Creation, resurrected in 2004, music is Durham Rangers)
- Black Joke
- Lollipop Man (dance retired)
- Dances with sticks
- Sweet Jenny Jones
- South Australia (#)
- I Can Hew (learned from Seabright Morris & Sowrd)
- Blue Balls (Blue Bells of Scotland)(dance retired)
- English Perverts' Garden (English Country Garden) (dance retired)
Bampton Dances:
Pretty much all Bampton dances use hanks, so of course we adapted one for
sticks...
- Simon's Fancy (written by Jocelyn Reynolds, music is Rambling Sailor)
- There's the page with notation and the tune for Simon's Fancy...
- Speed the Plow
- That Dance (a "modification" of one of the above for sticks, requires two left-handed dancers)
- Highland Mary (dance retired)
- Bonny Green Garters (seldom, if ever, done as a Rat dance)
Border Dances:
- Ragged Crow (music is Portabello Hornpipe)
- Surreal (written by Graham Taylor, based on Twiglett)
- Four Lane End (written by John Kirkpatrick, music of the same name by JK)
- Log (written by Lee Thompson-Herbert, music is the "Slinky" tune)
- Bald Headed End of the Broom (written by Lee Thompson-Herbert, music is the song of the same name)
- Tinner's Rabbits (from Grimspound Morris, music is the Scotch Polka)
- Dilwyn (#, music is Not For Joe, at least that's what we use)
- Crumbling Away (another dance written by Lee Thompson-Herbert, music is a Swedish tune of the same name, but in Swedish. The name, that is.)
- Datchett
Other Dances
- Old Bagpipes, aka "Geezers" (from Roy Dommet)
- Winster Processional
- Soldier O processional (written by Ed Stern)
- The Abbot's Bromley Horn Dance - the most screamingly traditional dance we do.
# We also have parade variations of some dances. These are jiggered to keep moving forward, and include figures like the Foot-up-and-up, and the Galloping Foot-up (or "we need to cover 50' Right Now")..
The Pervert's Wassail
Every year Berkeley Morris does a Wassail, and at the stops thereof they sing a wassail song Jon Berger wrote. We perverted the lyrics to that too...