What Are Those People Doing with Sticks and Accordions in Maplewood? Come See for Yourself!

If you walk through Maplewood on a Sunday afternoon, you might encounter a small group of people skipping around and clashing sticks together to what sounds like nursery rhyme music performed on accordions and fiddles. They could pop up anywhere, from the parking lot of Ryan Hummert Park, to the air-conditioned comfort of The Focal Point, or maybe even a secret third location known only to members…

What, pray tell, are they doing?

No, they are not live-action role-playing (LARPing), though this is not too far off. Rather, they are carrying on the centuries-old tradition of Morris dancing, a sort of seasonal street performance that could only have been invented (much less repeated) in the UK. It’s what would happen if Donatello (the bowstaff-wielding Ninja Turtle) created a mashup of square dancing and the Monty Python fish-slapping dance.

The Morris dances you are likely to encounter in Maplewood consist of four to six dancers arranged in a set carrying sticks or handkerchiefs. They dance around each other in choreographed figures, clashing sticks together, flicking hankies, or leaping into the air in time to catchy accordion and fiddle music.

There are many regional variations of Morris dancing around the UK, which include parades of folks in terrifying horse costumes in Cornwall and somber processions of church elders hefting centuries-old antlers over their heads in Staffordshire.

Fig 2. St. Louis River Rats perform in Chicago

Maplewood is fortunate to host sides (teams) representing two of those traditions:
● The Capering Roisters (Cotswold Morris)
● The St. Louis River Rats Border Morris (Border Morris).

The Cotswold style tends toward structure and stateliness, while Border can get wild and out of control. Before the pandemic, the Roisters and Rats met on different days of the week, but these days the two sides practice together on Sundays at 2 PM, sharing musicians and dancers.

Where Do The Teams Perform?
The major event every year for Morris sides is May Day (the 1st of May), on which morning Morris dancers all over the world dance the sun up to make sure that winter ends. Morris dancing likely originated in farming villages as a way to earn extra money during the off season, so it makes sense that folks dependent on the land would celebrate the return of the growing season. In St. Louis, the Roisters and Rats dance up the sun, complete with a maypole, at 5:45 AM every May Day at the Jewel Box in Forest Park.

Another favorite time to dance out locally is Halloween, the traditional end of summer and beginning of winter in the British Isles. Over the years, the sides have performed at various houses in Maplewood and the surrounding neighborhoods to celebrate the spooky season. The teams also make appearances at special events, such as the Queen’s Jubilee at The London Tea Room in 2022, a Halloween parade in Chicago in 2023, and a contra dance session in Webster Groves earlier this year.

A major gathering (The Midwest Morris Ale) of Morris dancers takes place each year on Memorial Day weekend somewhere in the midwest, and St. Louis generally sends folks to attend. This past May, we joined up with teams from all over the USA (and one from NZ) at a Girl Scout Camp in Scandia, MN; next year we’ll be somewhere in Colorado. We all learn a bunch of each other’s dances, then descend upon the host city en masse to beguile and bewilder the community with our unexpected art form. This is a great opportunity to make friends with people who are into all sorts of strange hobbies and bid on homemade jams in the silent auction.

What Does It Take to Become a Morris Dancer?
I set out to answer this question for myself back in 2022. I had attended concerts for years at The Focal Point on Sutton Blvd, and I noticed a blurb about free Morris dancing on Sunday afternoons. I was familiar with some of the music already from my attempts to teach myself an accordion-family instrument called the melodeon, which had become a favorite instrument of Morris sides due to its loud volume. I popped in the next Sunday to see what was going on, and it just so happened to be the first practice session either team had attempted post-pandemic.

I had never really danced, having grown up under the outmoded guidance that dancing wasn’t cool for boys. I had definitely never clashed sticks in time to music with other people while stepping in time to jigs, reels, and hornpipes and memorizing intricate choreographed figures. I was a computer programmer, for goodness’ sake!

It turned out the guy teaching me how to do Morris dancing was also a computer programmer. Someone else was a social worker, just like my wife. There were builders, nurses, radio DJs, high school students, and all sorts of folks. A few people had some prior dance experience (high school colorguard, contradance, Irish, etc.), but none were professionals. In having a non-dance background, I actually had a very similar background to the rest of the dancers. It felt good to fit in.

Is Morris Dancing for You?
Do you:
● Enjoy folk or world music?
● Have experience playing “pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker’s man” (or some other clapping
game)?
● Find yourself reading (or watching) sci-fi, fantasy, historical fiction, especially from British
authors?
● Appreciate a comforting cuppa and a nice baked good while catching up with a dear
friend?
● Knit?

While not exhaustive, these factors seem to indicate a potential for Morris success. Other symptoms could include interests in European art or military history and a healthy mistrust of AI. I suspect that you have what it takes to become a Morris dancer. If you’ve read this far, then you must at least be interested in weird things happening in your community. We are all just folks who think Morris dancing and the folks who study it are sufficiently interesting to keep us coming back. Some show up for the dancing, some for the exercise, some for the music, and some just for the occasional tacos. Our members range from college students to septuagenarians; in the past, sides in the UK were restricted by gender, but we welcome all.

If you would like to try us out (or just sit in on a practice to see what this article is even talking about), we’re generally at The Focal Point (2720 Sutton Blvd, Maplewood, MO) on Sunday afternoons at 2 PM. Sometimes the weather is too nice (or an event has kicked us out of The Focal Point), so we might be in the parking lot at Ryan Hummert Park (2400 Sutton Blvd, Maplewood, MO) instead. Sometimes we also just have to cancel practice due to life, because we’re just normal folks like you. With sticks. And accordions.