YDW 2008–2010: The Early Years

The first three Youth Dance Weekends were held at Timberlake Camp at Field and Wilderness in Plymouth, Vermont. YDW moved to Kinhaven Music School in Weston, VT in 2011 after Hurricane Irene damaged the Timberlake venue.

Origins

In 2006, Brian Gallagher attended a dance weekend in Wisconsin and quickly realized that at age 23, he was the youngest person there — only three other people under 35 were present. He and Carol Ormand (a Wisconsin-based caller) spent the weekend discussing the generation gap at dance weekends, and together they came up with the idea of a dance weekend specifically aimed at younger dancers.

Carol passed the torch to Brian, who recruited skilled young dance-organizer friends. The original YDW Committee was Brian Gallagher, Magdalen Zander, Julia Nickles, Ethan Hazzard-Watkins, Rebecca Lay, and Sarah Pilzer. The first Youth Dance Weekend happened in 2008.

2009 Staff Highlights

Rebecca Lay called contras at YDW 2009. Magic Foot performed at YDW 2009, playing tunes including “Joyride” by Erik Weberg, with Rebecca Lay calling.

Videos

Notes

  • YDW 2008 was the inaugural event: 100% of attendees were newcomers.
  • The first three YDWs (2008, 2009, 2010) used an age-based pricing system; the pay-what-you-can system was introduced in 2011.
  • Many traditions that started in the early years are still essential today: Money Musk, Softly Good Tummas, techno contras, shape-note singing, and tabletop discussion topics.

Pricing

2008–2010 used an age-based pricing system:

  • Ages 18–22: lower rate
  • Ages 23–28: medium rate
  • Ages 29–35: higher rate
  • Ages 36+: full rate

Specific amounts are not documented. This system was replaced by pay-what-you-can starting in 2011.