Cold Weather Waltz

Cold Weather Waltz by Fried de Metz Herman appears in her last publication, Serendipity. She wrote the dance in 2005 and dedicated it to a lovely dancer from England, Judith Hanson, who with her husband Michael had on several occasions attended the Fried-for-All in Lenox, Mass. It is a 3-couple mixer in waltz time to a tune that Fried labels a collage--a sure sign that she tinkered with some tunes to make the final music for the dance.
The most challenging part of the choreography is the unraveling of the "star-right plus one" into an ephemeral hands-6, which goes to the left only two places and then collapses into straight lines of three. The demonstration set in the foreground accomplishes this move with great finesse, in my opinion. You'll notice that the dancers do not look back when they take hands in the ring, which helps give forward momentum and clear definition to the circle.
The music at the 2012 Lenox Assembly, where this video was taken, was quite wonderful, for which we must thank Karen Axelrod, keyboard; Doug Creighton, flute and accordion; and Eric Martin, violin. Dancers in the top set include Robin Hayden and Daniel Popowich, Alixe Dancer and Steve Landowne, and Dale Mantautas and Ron Lehmkuhl.