Choose Your Partners!: Contra Dance & Square Dance Music of New Hampshire

1	Farewell to Whiskey/Silver and Gold Two Step / Rodney Miller's New England Dance Band 2:36
2	Money Musk / Old New England 3:27
3	The Woman Fiddler/Munster Lass/Rock Valley/Hullichan's Jig / Old New England 3:20
4	Larry O'Gaff / 2 Fiddles 2:47
5	Maggie in the Woods / 2 Fiddles 3:22
6	Mouth of the Tobique/Réel des Jeunes Mariés/Réel de Montréal / Northern Spy 4:31
7	Lady of the Lake/Fisher's Hornpipe/Red-Haired Boy/Miss Thompson / Northern Spy 6:54
8	Rosin the Beau/Waltz for Jane / Rodney Miller's New Englad Dance Band 4:10
9	Golden Slippers / Lester Bradley & Friends 4:30
10	Crooked Stove Pipe / Lester Bradley & Friends 3:36
11	Shandon Bells/Out on the Ocean/The Lame Duck/Mug of Brown Ale / Lamprey River Band 4:25
12	Fireman's Reel/Rising of the Lamprey/Silver Spear/High ... / Lamprey River Band 5:45
13	Neil Vincent's Welcome to Earth/Pig Town Fling/Durang's Hornpipe/Peace / Old New England 3:13
14	The Battering Ram/The Concertina Reel/Kiley's Reel / Rodney Miller's New England Dance Band 5:08
15	Cat in the Hooper/Coleraine/Shores of Lough Gowna / Rondey Miller's New England Dance Band 5:05
16	Amelia/Great Memories / Old New England 4:08

All Music Guide

New Hampshire is one of the American locales in which square dancing is most popular, both in contra dances (in which two lines of partners face each other) and square dances (in which four couples arrange themselves in a square formation). This 67-minute disc has 16 tunes suitable for the purpose, recorded in early 1999 by half a dozen bands active in the New Hampshire square dancing community. It's heaviest, as you might expect, on the fiddle, also including some dulcimer, mandolin, flute, and other instrumentation. The repertoire concentrates on music derived from British Isles and Celtic folk, including reels, jigs, and a couple of slower waltzes that break up the pace nicely; some of the songs include dance callers. It's more fun to dance to than listen to, but it's well recorded and annotated, and indeed probably good fodder for practicing these styles of folk dancing. Richie Unterberger