Yes its another of those oddball routines. Why the Morris dancer theme. I would guess that FC had this theme in her head for a while and this was the ideal routine to unleash it. Ring my bell=Legs & Co in this get up, bells and all. All very bizarre i must say. The routine itself is fine i guess, but nothing more. I like the hip shaking and those white costumes that show the girls legs off rather well. The set is sparse, with a few posts set up with what looks like old xmas decorations stuck on. Talking of Xmas, the second version of this is far superior and will be more warmly received by me. I do wonder if this routine was a late replacement, it kinda gives me that impression.
Legs ring a bell for Morris Dancing and come up with another winner. Traditionally a male pastime this derivation of the ancient art is much more to my liking and Flicks interpretation of the traditional Cotswold costume works a treat. All the ladies tease the audience with aplomb but for her little solo I'm choosing Pauline as my Dotd, although Sue's 'naughty boy' handkerchief swish at about the 2.29 mark is also a favourite moment. Although not a maximum I really enjoy this playful performance and so am giving it a 9.5.
very odd but endearing routine to this disco monster by Anita Ward, as Ryan said it looks like a late replacement for a probable Frisbee song, but who knows. It is delightful; and the all white does make it a bit harsh at times competing with the stark white light. Looks like Flick acted on the bells part and thought Morris dancing, how on earth this has to do with Morris dancing I have no idea.
This routine has grown on me over the weeks, and I find a slight perverse joy out of this, I have spotted Gill mistimed at the back near the end of the routine but that is nitpicking. The sly smile and side swipe and aside by Sue is a joy unto itself, but it's the captivating smile and maximum enjoyment of Rosemary that draws you in.
Scores on the doors:- well after my run of tens, i can only award this 9.5/10 (gosh I dropped my standards, but roll on Xmas)
Provocative Morris Dancing Ms Colby? Honestly, what next? But it does work and those white suits really show off the fine form on stage perfectly. There are some nice snippets by most of the Dancers as mentioned but I too have to award DotD to our soloist Pauline and I do enjoy this considerably despite it's slight quirkiness so I'm a 9/10 man this time
Tough luck that the girls had caught a cold at the same time but a first class performance and a 9/10 from me.
I don't think this was a last minute replacement as the song had reached number three and up to this point I don't think either a video or studio performance had been shown, and also the costumes match the bell theme.
I like their outfits and there are some nice moves performed, but this routine just lacks that X factor which transforms a good performance into a great one.
A week out for being May queens, the Legs ladies do straw hats and flowers a lot better than their effort two years earlier on the "Greatest Love of All" routine. Having a more upbeat song to perform too helps.
DotD: Just when I thought she was going to get sidelined once again, in comes Pauline and her delightful solo part to scoop the honours.
Given the subject matter of Anita Wards track, Flick could've gone for the obvious, & really tested the censors, but thankfully we have something, that's heaps more wholesome, more like a procession of cheerleaders, parading all about the stage, very near to the audience, & their faces tell us that they're clearly enjoying themselves here.
The ladies in this routine are dresses in white one piece bathing suits. And white hat with flowers around the rim. And sash of flowers over there shoulders. And carrying white handkerchiefs and waving them like Morris dancers. Am sorry I don't get the Morris dance idea for this routine. The Christmas version is far better routine than this routine. But there are some good moment in this routine. I like the Sue moment near the end of the song. And nice bit by Rosie. But it still a middling routine so I will after give it a middling score.
The morris dancing connection is obvious here. Morris dancers wear bells - the bells ward off evil spirits you see. Anita ward them off, you might say. As do the hankies. So there you go - i don't think Flick had the Morris idea in her head for a while and was waiting for a frisbee moment to chuck it in, she was thinking of bells and Morris came to mind. She was a woman educated in all the myriad and wonderful forms of dance afterall!
The girls here are dressed in Cotswolds style, the common form of Morris. The other two styles are Border and NorthWest, with Britannia Coco-nutters of Bacup very much doing their own thing.
The straw hats, garlands, tiny ankle bell-pads (listen carefully and they're there as they prance and shimmy!) and maypole-esque surroundings are all very much English summer fete. I can just imgaine melting ice creams and beers in squishy plastic glasses. Click of leather on willow and all that. As far removed from the saucey nature of song as you can get!
I like it. I can't see many traditional Morris steps in there - no caper, gallies, half-gyps or heys, but there are well defined common and distinctive figures. There are glimmers of Bampton and Fieldtown with maybe a hint of Adderbury at one point. Morris has been a mixed sport since the first world war saw off a whole generation of young Morris men, and today I don't think a single Morris side would turn these ladies down.
They all look great, it's a nice song and a fine dance. And most importantly not a single dropped hankie - a dropped hankie buys a round!
It may be of interest and no doubt amusement to folks that I myself have danced the Morris, way back in the dim & distant. Oh yes. And no, I'm not sharing the YouTube links. :-)
I told DeeDee once thinking/hoping she'd perhaps be a little impressed with my forays in to the world of dance. But no. "Morris dancing...?" she said, "It's a bit minging isn't it?". I quickly got her another glass of wine and said no more about it.
Dotd is again quite tough, good to see Pauline getting a solo, Rosie and her lovely legs are very tempting, but it's the swish that Suefan refered to that swayed my vote to Sue, a nice bit of icing on an already tasty cake! (I'll get me coat!)
The title of the song alone seems to have sparked the unlikely concept for this one. But whatya know, turns out OB is as at home at the corn mill as he is at exclusive metropolitan gatherings and he's able to provide us with a Jack Hargreaves-esque guide to proceedings. Ha Ha!
Happily with the garlands, swim-wear, and beach foot-wear it's more Mauritius than Morris. With the pulsing sound like a tropical bird cooing away in the tree-tops, at a bit of a stretch. The skeletal set isn't much cop though, giving the impression the studio techs had downed tools and gone on strike after a hour's work, leaving Flick to raid the Christmas box in desperation. The dancing, sprinkled with flirty moments, makes for very agreeable viewing, although I feel as others do that it just lacks that certain something that the best routines have. There's a good solo from Pauline but it's a pity the camera was shy: a rudimentary error of direction, I would have thought. And a super shimmy and 'get away with you' swish of the hankie from Sue. Pauline and her solo is not to be sneezed at however and she's my DOTD.
We've been spoilt with so many excellent routines lately, we just needed to take a breather. I've never heard of Morris dancing before, but, there you go, always learn something new here. "Ring My Bell" doesn't ring many of my bells unfortunately, neither the song nor the routine, but it's still a good performance even if not up to the high standard of the past weeks.
It seems Donna Summer briefly had some competition in the saucy pop song stakes, but whilst the track is good poor Anita was a one hit wonder. Bringing the village fete to the TOTP studios is a nice idea and they do look quite luverley is those all white pieces, jogging and shimmying up and down the stage. The set looks a bit ropey but having camera's positioned at both ends allows for some creative direction and meaning there is no set front or back as in a lot of 'in a line' style dances.
Whilst this is certainly not a let down by any means, 1979 has been of a high standard so far, and this not quite up there with some of the previous highs, 7/10 DOTD Rosie
I like this dance more than the Xmas one.All the hip shaking,tissue waving and loping from one end of the stage to the other is charming,and the costumes of course of great.The whole thing is most enjoyable to watch.It was good to see some audience girls dancing along too.Although they all look and move just fine i think Pauline's little solo bit deserves my putting her forward for top dancer this week.
Wasps aside, all that's missing from this Summer Fete dance, which looks as if it's located on a structurally-suspect float is a Maypole. Imagine a Legs & Co. routine involving ribbons not hanging lank from above, as in the Love Is In The Air or I Wanna Get Next To You performances but fully integrated into the dance. On one occasion the ladies seem to be using the handkerchiefs to send out a message in semaphore : 'Help! The poles are wobbling.' Close inspection of the opening shot reveals a sleigh-bell or two affixed the the ankle-based flower-chains. Love the occasions when the ladies dash quickly to find their floor spots in a dance which just about has the right amount of allure thanks to the rear views offered by the costumes. Those hats are tough to adore, though. Both Sue, with her 'get away' swish of the handkerchief and Pauline with her snake-hipped solo, where a close up of any kind would have been welcomed, catch the eye.
I really like this jolly little number with the girls doing a bit of morris type dancing ,nice leotards with accessories to match the performance ,a well deserved 8.5 please
What the fudge!?! I don't get the Morris Dancer theme, the only thing I can think of is maybe the bell ringing reference. Anyway it kind of works, and it's a bit different. Girls look great, although the routine and song don't do an awful lot for me.
I'm not 100% convinced the routine goes with the song but nice try anyway. Pauline gets DOTD for her solo in particular. Routine struggles with a 6.
I know i sound like a record stuck on repeat play, but once again a routine (and a very good one at that) is marred by the lighting situation. I guess if the set is adorned with paper lanterns, then it wouldn't work if it was to brightly lit. We get nice half silhouettes of the girls, but with such a clever worked routine with all the oriental moves, it just leaves this viewer frustrated, like quite a few performances from this period.
The actual routine itself though is quite splendid, i love all the stereotypical moves, the bowing etc. Given this routine, any choreographer would have done the same with the Jappo feel to it.
Just aside from Legs, i wonder why did Roxy Music went through `wilderness years` during this period ? Anyhow Mr Ferry`s song here is pretty good. So my rating for the dance, 7 out of 10.
Yes indeed, in spite of the lighting, or lack thereof, this has a certain something down in small part to the choreography, which some like and some don't, but in large part to the performances which are spot on. Had these ladies not chosen a career in dance I'm sure they could have been just as successful on the dramatic stage. Overall though this is not a real favourite as old SF is not a fan of those hair styles. I can live with a certain confinement to the coiffure in such classics as "Love You Inside Out" or "....Beautiful Body" but as a general rule I prefer wild and unruly locks, the more unruly the better.
This is not one of my favorites, sorry. I don't like the song even though I'm an ardent fan of much of Roxy Music's work and even some of Bryan's solo stuff. The dim lighting is a nusiance and I don't really like the choreography and set even though i do understand the need to reflect the music. The ladies do their level best as always but I can't find it in myself to give this more than 3/10.
Thus would be a very good dance routine, of it wasn't for the lighting, which seemed to render the dancers in silhouette form during close-up camera shots. The lighting itself befittingly has an oriental theme, domestic lighting complete with paper lantern style lamp-shades, if you look carefully enough, you'll notice that there's a tear in the canvass of one of the shades, the rest of the set was fairly spartan looking, I think that this routine is another one of those that was a last-minute job, a routine that had to be drastically changed when the previously chosen track to dance to, had to be 'frisbeed', but there's plenty of worse routines out there!
As mentioned before, I for one do not like the choreography with its 'sterotypical moves' . Not good but I can see the temptation was too great with a title like 'Tokyo Joe' . But I do quite like the song.
Not sure how to rate this. I think it's a great song, but the performance is a little basic and the lighting is awful, but I do find myself quite enjoying it. Erm...
This could have been a cracker with some proper lighting and a few close ups - or different shots even.
Yes you've got lanterns like they have in Japan, we get the picture. Can we see some pretty faces now!?
I love this one.The set and lighting are great,not least the flashing rising sun on the backdrop.Even the lack of light lends itself to the mysterious east.We know who the dancers are cos we're so familiar with them,the uninitiated couldn't tell them apart.There are lots of great dance moves.I particularly like Rosie at the point when Byron Ferrari starts to sing,and i love it when they all leap into the air.Different and imaginative.
Ha ha love it VV, however I thought I'd try and catch you out, so I googled your post to see what it really meant... unfortunately this is the reply I got: