Shifnal Folk Dance Club

Shifnal Folk Dance Club is affilliated to the English Folk Dance and Song Society

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When do we meet?

The history of the club

Beginner's dances

Other groups in our area

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Folk dancing -
fun for all ages

Shifnal Folk Dance Club logo

Helping others

At our 35th birthday party in November 2005 the Shifnal Folk Dance Club raised over £300 which was donated to Cancer Research

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*Come and have a look around*
Don't be frightened by the logo, we don't do anything strange with bells (or sticks), we are a folk dance group who meet once a month in Shifnal, Shropshire. Here we have a good time attempting to dance and generally socialise. We are just one of many folk dance groups in the United Kingdom and are always happy to get new participants. Just click on the icons at the side to find out more about us.
You don't need to have any previous experience of folk dancing, it does help if you know your right from your left, but this is optional, because we all get hopelessly lost (frequently). If you think you would like to try dancing, but feel intimidated, there is a very gentle introduction available through the U3A (University of the third age). The Shifnal branch hold a folk dancing group on the 2nd Thursday of the month between 2 and 4 pm. These are easy dances, with instruction and live music. Please come along or contact Jenny for more information. Directions can be found by clicking Where are we? and on the Beginners Dances link on the left you may find the answers to some of your questions.
Folk dancing is a seriously good way of enjoying yourself, keeping fit, making new friends, and enjoying yourself at the same time. Did I say enjoying yourself twice; that's because the first rule of folk dancing is, well, enjoy yourself. If you get hopelessly lost during the dance who cares just so long as your having fun.
No matter how lost or confused you may get there is always someone there to help, assuming they are not even more lost than you are. If all else fails we blame the caller for causing the confusion. This is the normal cop out clause, the caller got it wrong and yes it really does happen. All of the dances are "walked through" first. This way you get a chance to practise the movements without music and get someone to show you the more difficult parts, such as which direction is to the left or to the right.
To make sure that we don't wear ourselves out we have an interval for refreshments at around the 9 o'clock point in the evening.
Join in our New Year fun

	Here you can see a meeting where David Smith, the caller for the evening, walks the sets of dancers through some of the more difficult parts of a dance, in this case which way is clockwise around a circle. Life was much easier when we used sun dials was heard being muttered somewhere in the background.
	The dancers are seen preparing for a different dance. The variety of dances keeps everyone entertained, not least of which is the caller who likes the challenge of seeing how close his words and our dancing come to the original dance. The term dance is used loosely because sometimes it ends up as synchronised milling around.On a good day (evening) we get one or two correct.
	Refreshment time already? Someone has to test the whether the kettle is working and it is thirsty work preparing to call. Here you can see David Smith working himself up to a frenzy (well he managed to lean on the top) before the evenings dancing began. David is one of the callers we welcome at the club.

Come along and join in the fun

We pay £2.50 per person and this goes to cover the cost of the hall, caller, musician(s) and refreshments. The venue is NO SMOKING, but the consumption of alcohol is allowed; please take your empties away for recycling.
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