Layla, Layla Palisades Folk Dancers of New Jersey 30th Anniversary Party

Date: April 15, 2010. Uploaded by Jim Gold. Videographer: Carol Karels. Produced by Jim Gold International, Jim Gold teacher of folk dances in USA and organizer of folk tours around the world. More info at www.jimgold.com
PALISADES FOLK DANCERS:
A BRIEF HISTORY OF 30 YEARS OF GOOD TIMES
by Ginny BrandmaierGarry Karner and Jeff Weisel started the Palisades FD group early in 1980 when Garry returned to the U.S. to begin his PhD. They went to Romania with Sunni Bloland, a teacher and researcher of Romanian dance. Jeff also went with Mihai David and Karl Finger in 1978 for 3 weeks that summer to collect new material for teaching. The Palisades group had no official connection to Columbia, but many of the dancers worked at Columbia University's Lamont Laboratories. The first place they danced was at a small church in Palisades, NY near work. The favorite dances were Romanian. Every Saturday night the teachers carried stereo equipment, records, tapes in their cars to the church, they made a map showing where everything was in the room, moved everything and set up. At the end of the evening, out came the map, and the room was restored. We danced in that church for many years, until one night there was a big party with Zlatne Uste, (a Balkan Brass Band) that lasted until the wee hours. The neighbors complained and Palisades FD had to find a new home. We moved south to NJ to the Alpine Community House right off 9W.

When Jeff had left the group, Doug Shearer joined Garry as a teacher, later still Linda Gross taught with Doug. I'll never forget Linda in tears trying to teach us Mairi's Wedding! Our first workshops were with Ercument Kilic and over the years we had many of his Turkish, and Ajerbaijani dances added to the repertoire. Jaap Leegwater taught us Bulgarian dances. Many of the dancers joined George Tomov's performing group, and we learned many Macedonian dances from them and from George Tomov, himself, a master teacher.

We were asked to leave our Alpine home after putting rosin on the floor because it was so slippery. Another request to depart. Fortunately we've been here in Tenafly about 20 years, we hope we stay many more years.

Over the years we have hosted many great master teachers like Steve Kotansky, Yves Moreau, Michael Ginsburg, Joe Graziosi, Paul Ginis, Demetri Tashie, Ahmet Lulegi, Nina Kavardjikova, Teneke van Geel, Tom Bozigian, and many more. They have given us beautiful dances, difficult dances, easy dances, fast ones and slow ones and many, many years of great dancing and its been a pleasure.

The Palisades CommitteeGinny and Hal Brandmaier, Judy Katz, Bill King, Joyce De Saussure, Jeff Levene, Ginger Gordon, Karen Shannon, Al Zwicker

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