The Maids of Clifton

Background music: A selection of our dance tunes played on the melodeon by our musician

Current dances in our repertoire:

Most are danced in a set of eight.

The Rose - danced using half hoop decorated garlands to a skip step (Music: The Rose Tree)

Marston - danced using long sticks to an alternate rant and skipping step (Music: 100 Pipers)

Runcorn - danced using hankies and danced to a double step (Music: Winster Gallop/Donkey Riding/Buffalo Girls)

Ashton - danced using long sticks to a rant step (Music: Brighton Camp)

Piper's Ash - danced using short sticks to an alternate rant and skipping step (Music: Jenny Lind Polka)

Knutsford - danced using long sticks to a skip step (Music: Cock of the North)

Basque - danced using decorated garlands to a double step (Music: Monks' March)

White Ladies - danced with hankies (Music: 3 Jolly Sheepskins/Speed the Plough)

Keswick - danced with long sticks (Music: Oyster Girl/Rogue's March)

Queen's Park- danced with long sticks to a skip step (Music: The Jingo Song)

Lancashire Garland - danced with decorated half hoop garlands to a rant step (Music: Tralee Jail/Maggie in the Wood)

Millbrook - danced with long sticks to a skip step (Music: Winster Processional/Floral Dance)

Gisburn - usually a processional dance to an alternate walking and skipping step (Music: Old 95th)

Horbury Polka - danced to a mixture of walking and ranting steps (Music: 2 unnamed French tunes)

Chandelier Basque - danced to a mixture of ranting, walking and skipping steps and using bare garlands which are clashed during the dance. The dance was learnt at a Garland Workshop organised by Oaks and Acorns garland team and presided over by Roy Dommett. He collected it from a team called the Yorkshire Chandelier, who we met last year at a festival at Grimsthorpe Castle. (Music: Tit for Tat/Princess Amelia's Birthday)

Bobbin Dance - an original dance written by one of the founder members of the team, Elinor Graham. The dancers hold bobbins and use a mixture of steps with movements echoing the stages of production or terms used in the cotton mills:- Bobbins/Flying Shuttles/Water-wheels/ Weaving (Music: Lilli Bolero/Belle Rosine)

Wedding Dance - another original dance from Elly, written as a short dance for a set of four to celebrate the wedding of one of the team. Danced with hankies, some of the movements, again, reflect the wedding day celebrations, with names such as Rings, Arches & Greetings (Music: Woodcutters' Jig/Farmer's Boy)

Plymouth Reel - unusually, danced in multiples of three, with each dancer holding hankies (Music: Soldier's Joy)

Clitheroe - danced with small sticks. A dance borrowed from our friends, Sergeant Musgrave's Dance.

Golbourne - danced with short sticks and currently " work in progress" and not yet danced out!

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