About the Club

 

Rambling Eights is a caller-run square dance club, run by our  caller David Pearce and his wife Faith.

David has been calling Square Dancing for 40 years and over that time has established clubs in Armidale and Glen Innes NSW.  When he moved to Brisbane in 1985 he established Rambling Eights on Brisbane's southside. The club celebrated their 25th birthday in February 2011

 

The club has always had a reputation as a good training ground for dancers and David is keen to continue that.  He enjoys teaching and calling for new dancers and the more experienced, but can and does tailor his calls to the abilities of those present on any given occasion.

 

Before he retired David was involved in corporate training, he is an excellent teacher and can clearly explain, demonstrate and reinforce the moves he teaches.  He has a lot of fun doing it and we have a lot of fun learning.

The club has a "Trainee Caller", Barbara O'Connor, who is learning to entertain and teach the dancers with her calling. Barbara has attended several caller training sessions and a week long callers school as well as receiving tuition from David. Her calling and stage presence is developing with each call. Barbara won the amateur callers contest held by the Qld. Callers Association this year.

 

A typical evening consists of a number of brackets with rest periods in between.  In the early part of the evening there will be some teaching of various square dance moves, followed by a singing call that uses the moves just taught.  Brackets will be mixed up between beginner, mainstream and plus levels depending on the dancers present.

 

Later on, the brackets generally consist of a hoedown - which is a series of called moves with a rhythmic backing track - followed by a singing call - which is a recognizable song with square dance calls intermixed with the song lyrics.

 

Square dancing is sometimes broken up with brackets of round dancing or line dancing, and there is a break for a cuppa and some supper and the few bits of administration necessary.

 

A few times a year the club holds special dances - Club birthday, Christmas in July, Christmas proper and so on, where members of other clubs are especially invited to attend.  We also hold an annual square dance weekend camp  at Lake Perseverance which is a huge load of fun.

 

Of course the club is part of and supports the Queensland and Australian Square Dance societies, and members often attend other Clubs' dances and Society events.