Louise Siddons, Dance Caller
Louise Siddons is a contra, ceilidh, and English country dance caller based in Winchester, in the south of England (UK).
As an historian, teacher, and caller of traditional social folk dances and related forms from the seventeenth century through to the present, she enjoys creating a dance experience and atmosphere that is welcoming, fun, and at an appropriate skill level for the dancers present. Her stage presence is low-key and light-hearted. She is known for her explorations of queer- and non-binary experiences in folk dancing, both as an historian and as one of the pioneers of role- and gender-free teaching and calling in social folk dance.
Louise began calling in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 2008, and since then she has enjoyed working at major folk festivals in North America, across the UK, and in Europe. Louise also has a PhD in art history and is Professor of Visual Politics at Winchester School of Art, part of the University of Southampton.
You can watch videos of Louise calling: contras and English, including ceilidh.
Check out a list of Louise's upcoming gigs, including our local ceilidh series, WinQeilidh!
Louise also organises Contra Camp at Halsway Manor, which this year among other things produced her new dance Kyriarky.
Louise believes that one of the greatest strengths of traditional dance is its adaptability and responsiveness to the needs of those dancing. Since 2017, she has primarily been using positional calling (without role terms, gendered or otherwise), and although she will defer to organisers, she prioritises bookings that request or require gender-free calling. She also favors descriptive terminology over jargon.
More About Louise
Mary Wesley and the Country Dance and Song Society produce a podcast, From the Mic, about callers and calling. Louise had fun chatting with Mary in Episode 13.
Find out some of the ways Louise matches her calling to what the dancers are looking for in my episode of Lisa Heywood's brilliant Caller's Chat series on Youtube.
Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, the Historical Tea and Dance Society of Pasadena, California, organized talks with major figures in the social folk dance world, titled "5 Things in the Dancing Mind of..." Louise was honoured to be their guest on September 15, 2020. You can watch it here.