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The Bradstow Reel

The Bradstow Reel is an English Country Dance. It was devised by Eddie Upton in 1983 and published in English Dance & Song, Vol. XLVI No. 1, Spring 1984. It is an improper duple minor longways dance. The minor set lasts 32 bars.

This dance uses a "ladies chain, north country style", a figure new to me, but which is described on contrafusion. The ladies pull-by right in the center as usual, they offer their left hands to the men they approach. The men move to their right before the ladies arrive, and offer ladies their left hands. The men do not turn. They always face in to the square. Men raise their left hands and the ladies back under ending behind their respective men, facing their backs. The men put their right hands behind their backs, and take the ladies' hands in their right hands (dropping hold with their left), step to the left. The ladies meanwhile step forward and right to stand beside their new partners.

This version of the chain have the ladies doing an extra allemande right in the center.

The animation plays at 120 counts per minute normally, but the first time through the set the dance will often be slowed down so people can learn the moves more readily. Men are drawn as rectangles, women as ellipses. Each couple is drawn in its own color, however the border of each dancer indicates what role they currently play so the border color may change each time through the minor set.

The dance contains the following figures: set, circle, hands across, star promenade, arming (and probably others).

If you find what you believe to be a mistake in this animation, please leave a comment on youtube explaining what you believe to be wrong. If I agree with you I shall do my best to fix it.

If you wish to link to this animation please see my comments on the perils of youtube. You may freely link to this page, of course, and that should have no problems, but use one of my redirects when linking to the youtube video itself:
https://www.upadouble.info/redirect.php?id=TheBradstowReel

This website is copyright © 2021-2025 by George W. Williams V
My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.