Last Updated 23rd February 2001
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Meeting at King’s College, Newcastle, 18 April 1959
The sixty-seventh meeting of the Morris Ring was held at King’s College, Newcastle on Saturday April 18th, 1959 at the invitation of the King’s Collage Morris Men who made all the arrangements. It took the form of an instruction meeting in Cotswold Morris and was intended to be complementary to the one held at Cecil Sharp House on the proceeding week-end, for the convenience of the northern clubs.
About 50 dancers attended, representing the following seven clubs: - Derwent Valley, King’s College N/C, Leeds, Monkseaton, Newcastle, Stockton and White Rose.
Instruction in the Ilmington dances was given by Bill Cassie and in the Sherborne tradition by the Bagman of the Ring. During the morning and afternoon simultaneous sessions were held in the small Gymnasium (for Ilmington) and in the Writing Room of the University Union (for Sherborne), the dancers swapping over from one room to the other at mid-morning and mid-afternoon. All the published Ilmington dances were covered and some half-dozen Sherbourne dances. The musicians were Colin Ross & George Mockler, fiddlers (for Sherbourne),
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and Garth Flack, accordionist (for Ilmington). Most of the men had lunch and tea in the Union refectory and after tea an hour was spent all together in the Writing Room polishing up a small selection of dances which are commonly shown as massed dances at Ring Meetings. After this the bar was opened and a Morris Ale was held from 6.30 till about 9.30 p.m. During the Ale there were songs by Derek Morris. The musicians already mentioned were joined by Tom Prince of Derwent Valley (concertina) and John Flack & Derek Morris (fiddlers).
The Ring (and particular the northern clubs) are indebted to King’s College Morris men for arranging what by all accounts appears to have been enjoyable and useful day of dancing.
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