DAVE HUTCHINSON
BASIC, MAINSTREAM, PLUS and ADVANCED
Limestone Dancers are very pleased to have Dave Hutchinson as our Club Caller. Dave will be calling/teaching on Tuesday evenings for both Basic/Mainstream & Plus levels.
Dave has been calling since 1982 and calls from the Basic level to the C2 level.
Dave has a grown family of three with four grandchildren.
In addition to being a very qualified square dance caller, Dave is also a Certified Scuba Dive Instructor.
[email protected]
Here is Dave in his own words (reprinted from Square Time, December 2019)
It all started in 1958 in a one room log cabin in the wilds of southern Ontario. Sorry, wait, that’s a different story.
It actually started in 1965 when I learned to square dance as a child. In 1966, there is a picture of me calling my first singing call at seven years old. I still remember the name of it, “Tie me Kangaroo down”. Through the years 1970-1974, we always attended the American National Conventions with our parents and learned to dance properly in a room filled with 40-50 squares of teenage dancers. In 1978, after a 4 year hiatus, I got back into square dancing and immediately decided that I wanted to be a caller. In the summer of that year, I took my first caller’s course under the guidance of three of the most well-known callers of the day, Stu Robertson, Orphie Easson/Marcellus, and Norm Wilcox. Come the fall of 1978, I was lucky enough to call one tip a night at Scarborough Squares under the tutelage of John Park, who not only helped me further my calling career, but also taught me how to teach.
In 1979, I started my own club in Pickering with the help of my parents. We were a small group and, during that first year, I had to dance while calling just to make up a square. The dancers did stand by me and, with their help and thoughtful promotions, that club became the Star Promenaders Square Dance Club of Pickering and we were dancing at least fifteen squares every week.
In 1981, I was approached and asked to call for the Quinte Twirlers of Belleville as their club caller, Garnet May, had recently passed away. I agreed and started calling for them the 1981-82 season and continued to call for them for the next 19 years.
In 1983, I picked up another square dance club, the Trenton Pairs and Squares, and called for them for the next 24 years. Also in 1983, I was asked to teach a clogging group that Ed McQuaid was starting in Belleville. This was interesting as I had taken exactly two lessons in my life, but I said okay. I found myself learning something one week in Richmond Hill and teaching it the next in Belleville. The club prospered and I taught there for the next eight years. So, with clubs in Pickering, Belleville and Trenton, I was now busy five nights a week, as well as working full-time as an auto mechanic. Throughout the 1980’s and 90’s, I also did a lot of travelling and weekend dances in both USA and Canada.
Whilst I was doing a lot of calling and travelling in those days, I always kept my eye on the one prize for callers in this area, being hired for T&D’s International Convention. It was the early 90’s that I received the call asking me to appear on staff at the convention. I agreed and, let me tell you, I was scared to death of screwing up. Fortunately, it all went well, well enough to the point that I was hired back in future years.
People find it hard to believe that, still to this day, I get very nervous when calling. I always have, and I always will. I remember once, when one of the top callers in North America turned to me and said, “Don’t worry. I get nervous all the time too. It means you care!”
There have been two very prominent one-time peaks in my career. Number one happened at an American National Square Dance Convention in Baltimore, MD, where I got the chance to call with over 5000 dancers on the floor. I was so scared, I just about fainted, but came out of it unscathed. The second was appearing live on the Tommy Hunter 25th Anniversary special broadcast from Hamilton Place and shown across the nation.
In closing, I do what I do because I love square dancing. I love the intricacies and how they can be put together, but mostly, it’s about the people I have met and the lifelong friendships I’ve made in the square dance world.
BASIC, MAINSTREAM, PLUS and ADVANCED
Limestone Dancers are very pleased to have Dave Hutchinson as our Club Caller. Dave will be calling/teaching on Tuesday evenings for both Basic/Mainstream & Plus levels.
Dave has been calling since 1982 and calls from the Basic level to the C2 level.
Dave has a grown family of three with four grandchildren.
In addition to being a very qualified square dance caller, Dave is also a Certified Scuba Dive Instructor.
[email protected]
Here is Dave in his own words (reprinted from Square Time, December 2019)
It all started in 1958 in a one room log cabin in the wilds of southern Ontario. Sorry, wait, that’s a different story.
It actually started in 1965 when I learned to square dance as a child. In 1966, there is a picture of me calling my first singing call at seven years old. I still remember the name of it, “Tie me Kangaroo down”. Through the years 1970-1974, we always attended the American National Conventions with our parents and learned to dance properly in a room filled with 40-50 squares of teenage dancers. In 1978, after a 4 year hiatus, I got back into square dancing and immediately decided that I wanted to be a caller. In the summer of that year, I took my first caller’s course under the guidance of three of the most well-known callers of the day, Stu Robertson, Orphie Easson/Marcellus, and Norm Wilcox. Come the fall of 1978, I was lucky enough to call one tip a night at Scarborough Squares under the tutelage of John Park, who not only helped me further my calling career, but also taught me how to teach.
In 1979, I started my own club in Pickering with the help of my parents. We were a small group and, during that first year, I had to dance while calling just to make up a square. The dancers did stand by me and, with their help and thoughtful promotions, that club became the Star Promenaders Square Dance Club of Pickering and we were dancing at least fifteen squares every week.
In 1981, I was approached and asked to call for the Quinte Twirlers of Belleville as their club caller, Garnet May, had recently passed away. I agreed and started calling for them the 1981-82 season and continued to call for them for the next 19 years.
In 1983, I picked up another square dance club, the Trenton Pairs and Squares, and called for them for the next 24 years. Also in 1983, I was asked to teach a clogging group that Ed McQuaid was starting in Belleville. This was interesting as I had taken exactly two lessons in my life, but I said okay. I found myself learning something one week in Richmond Hill and teaching it the next in Belleville. The club prospered and I taught there for the next eight years. So, with clubs in Pickering, Belleville and Trenton, I was now busy five nights a week, as well as working full-time as an auto mechanic. Throughout the 1980’s and 90’s, I also did a lot of travelling and weekend dances in both USA and Canada.
Whilst I was doing a lot of calling and travelling in those days, I always kept my eye on the one prize for callers in this area, being hired for T&D’s International Convention. It was the early 90’s that I received the call asking me to appear on staff at the convention. I agreed and, let me tell you, I was scared to death of screwing up. Fortunately, it all went well, well enough to the point that I was hired back in future years.
People find it hard to believe that, still to this day, I get very nervous when calling. I always have, and I always will. I remember once, when one of the top callers in North America turned to me and said, “Don’t worry. I get nervous all the time too. It means you care!”
There have been two very prominent one-time peaks in my career. Number one happened at an American National Square Dance Convention in Baltimore, MD, where I got the chance to call with over 5000 dancers on the floor. I was so scared, I just about fainted, but came out of it unscathed. The second was appearing live on the Tommy Hunter 25th Anniversary special broadcast from Hamilton Place and shown across the nation.
In closing, I do what I do because I love square dancing. I love the intricacies and how they can be put together, but mostly, it’s about the people I have met and the lifelong friendships I’ve made in the square dance world.
