Playford-to-the-Present 2020

The 2020 Playford-to-the-Present Ball was supposed to have been our 20th anniversary gala, and we were in the process of planning something very grand. Sadly (as we all know), the COVID-19 pandemic closed down in-person dancing across the world, so Culver City English Country Dance was forced to postpone our Playford-to-the-Present Ball until 2021.

Since we couldn’t meet in person and we still wanted to celebrate our milestone achievement, we decided to take the celebration online! We held a Special Virtual Event on Saturday, October 3, 2020 — the date our ball would have happened. “Come celebrate the First Twenty Years of Playford-to-the-Present Balls!,” we wrote in our promotional announcement (see below). The event included memories, stories, photos, and videos from past callers, musicians, dancers, and friends, all to commemorate our 20 years of Playford-to-the-Present balls.

The “doors” opened at 3:30 p.m. for socializing, and a special slideshow organized by Dan Vilter started at 3:50. Formal attire was encouraged for the free event, which officially began at 4 p.m. and was emceed by Renée Camus. We also included a few favorite dances chosen from previous ball programs, called by Judee Pronovost with live music from Linda Kodaira and Bill Marks. Jeffrey Spero provided beautiful interstitial music, and folks stayed and socialized until at least 6 p.m. It was a delightful event and a wonderful respite from the loneliness of lockdown.

Playford-to-the-Present 2020 Program of Dances:
Dances were selected from P2P programs from previous years.

Faithless Nancy Dawson (1964) — 2003 Ball
Turn of the Tide (1998) — 2004, 2013, & 2018 Balls
Softly, Good Tummas (1718) — 2010 & 2018 Balls
Sunlight Through Draperies (2002) — 2019 Ball
A Trip to Paris (1726) — 2001 & 2015 Balls

Playford-to-the-Present 2020 videos

Our historian and CCECD co-founder James Hutson presented a history of the Playford-to-the-Present Ball, which can be seen here:

A brief history of CCECD’s Playford-to-the-Present ball since its beginning in 2001.

Dan Vilter created a slideshow of photos to kick off the event (you can see it on YouTube).

https://youtu.be/VHl5ih0uoto

The event was recorded (except for the very beginning), and can be seen on YouTube.

Here is the promotional flyer (left) and the booklet (right) for our Playford-to-the-Present 2020 Virtual Celebration. (Click to download.)

P2P Online Celebration flyer
The flyer for our Playford-to-the-Present 2020 Online Celebration.
Playford-to-the-Present 2020 booklet
The booklet for our Playford-to-the-Present 2020 Online Celebration (click to read and download).

We even had birthday cake for Judee’s birthday … which everyone ate. 😊

Thanks to these wonderful community members for their contribution to the event and their help in making it so special:

  • Administrative chairs: Sparky Sotcher and Mickey Waring
  • Emcee: Renée Camus
  • Historian: James Hutson
  • Slide Show: Dan Vilter
  • Interstitial Music: Jeffrey Spero
  • Publicity: Elyse Ashton
  • Birthday cake graphic: Alex Bradley
  • Background Graphic: Barbara Stewart and Tim Steinmeier
  • Zoom Host: Aileen Poehls
  • Zoom Monitors: Larry Hansen and Reed Wilson