Welcome to my biography page. I'm from Roseburg in southwestern Oregon. I've been calling for more than 25 years.
I love to call dances. Leading folks through patterns across the floor, synthesizing my voice with the dances and the lilting music — I am honored and proud to be the leader for such an evening.
Long paragraphs can be mind-numbing. So here are some relevant things about my background in a bullet-point format that is easy and quick to read. Enjoy.
- Grew up in New York City (Queens) — but that is a very old tale not much related to calling and dancing. After college in Syracuse and then a few years around Asia (in the Peace Corps in Sarawak, Malaysia) and stretches on farms in New Zealand and Vermont and also in New York City in various jobs, I went to Cornell to change my path and earn a Masters degree in my new professional field — livestock nutrition. Then I needed an agricultural job, which brought me to the mountains in West Virginia ... where traditional string music is simply a part of life.
- In the late 1970s, I lived in Elkins, West Virginia, where I first learned about mountain music and dance. There I also learned to clog and call. These were the hippie days. The local caller at that time was Bob Dalsemer who was living in Elkins temporarily to collect those mountain dances he later published in his book. Some local musicians had formed a band called Trapezoid, and its bass player, Ralph Gordon, was a friend who first taught me how to clog.
- I first learned to call from Sandy Bradley at the Augusta Dance week in 1979. Two other callers who influenced me greatly were Larry Edelman and John McCutcheon. John doesn't call dances any longer, but back then, he was one of the best callers anywhere, and there was no one quite like him.
- I still remember Sandy Bradley's response to a question about publicity for callers. She said that at the end of the evening, if the dancers leave the hall smiling and wanting to come back again — they may not know your name as a caller, but you've done your job.
- In the early 1980s I moved to Ithaca NY, where there was a vibrant old-time scene, a big one. I began calling at parties and dances. This was before contras spread across the country. Some of our local bands were the Horseflies and the Highwoods band (then metamorphosed into the Backwoods band) with Mac Benford and Joe Fallen. Other Ithaca folks at that time were Claudio Buchwald, the left-handed fiddler now of The Monks in Bloomington, Cheryl Hurwitz and the others from Wicky Sears, and Tara Nevins. A old friend from then is Ted Crane, who is a caller and organizer of the Ted Crane dance database that is a main Internet reference for national dance scheduling.
- In my first years of calling. I called only squares, running sets, and mixers — always with fast old-time music. These were the dances we did at parties and evening events. Contras were simply not yet part of the scene.
- I had already been calling for more than seven years before I called my first contra. I still remember that first contra dance — Herbie Gaudreau's “Becket Reel” which we also know as the “Bucksaw Reel”. At the time, I didn't know enough about contras to appreciate that maybe this wasn't the easiest dance choice to start with. Oh well. But the dancers still had a good time.
- While I lived in Ithaca in the early 1980s, I was also a founding member of the legendary clogging team The Limberjacks. For three years, we performed all around upstate NY and also Pennsylvania, including on television and at the state square dance competition at the New York State Fair.
- In the 1980s, After completing my Ph.D. degree in Animal Nutrition, I moved to Madison, Wisconsin for a faculty position at the University of Wisconsin. I continued to call dances, with greater frequency. I also danced with the Madison clogging team The Kickapoo Cloggers. A little later, I also formed a small, advanced, very eclectic percussive dance troupe called The Barking Frog Cloggers.
- Another major event occurred in 1988 — I married a wonderful woman named Jeri Frank, who many know as one of the finest dancers on the dance floor.
- Since we moved to Oregon in 1990, I've called more than 500 dance events throughout the Pacific Northwest and around the country. I've traveled on many tours with wonderful bands such as Lift Ticket and KGB. I've had the pleasure of calling with some of the finest musicians in the country. For example, I've called over 100 dances with the great fiddler Rex Blazer.
- And my professional life, I am a private ruminant nutritionist and forage specialist. I own my own consulting firm, Lane Livestock Services, and I work with clients all across the U.S. and Canada. I specialize in the nutrition of sheep, beef cattle, goats, horses, alpacas, etc, and also grazing and pasture management. I give workshops, write articles, teach private agricultural courses, facilitate farmer study groups, and work directly with many farmers and ranchers.
- In the past ten years, I've called at dance camps and major festivals from Fairbanks to Florida, including the 2008 National Folk Festival held in Butte, Montana.
- Conducted dozens of callers' workshops.
- Taught more than 200 workshops on clogging and percussive dance.
- I call contras and squares and mixers and running sets — whatever is fun for the crowd and makes them happy. I can call at all levels of dancer skill, from the wildest weddings and parties to huge folk festivals and lovely contra evenings to the most advanced workshop sessions at weekend dance camps.
- You could say that I bridge both the worlds of contras and squares. I started out learning the skills of calling squares to fast old-time music, and clogging on stage to driving Appalachian fiddle tunes. Over the years as contras have become more popular, I moved into calling contras, and I cherish the beauty and depth of this music and the hypnotic flow of the dances. Contras, squares, mixers, running sets — most evenings mostly contras, some events mostly squares. They are all fun. Each event is unique. Crowds are different, evenings are different, bands are different. But always, always, everyone is there for a good time. And at the end of the evening, if the dancers leave the hall smiling and wanting to return, I feel that I've done my job.