Tapestry Rental Partner

Minnesota Traditional Morris (MTM) is a men's performance group doing dances in the English Cotswold Morris tradition. Our performance season begins on May Day, dancing the sun up, and continues into early October. Morris dancers are known for wearing white, with bells on their legs and colored ribbons, vests or sashes. Most of the dances are sets of 6 or 8 dancers, waving handkerchiefs or clashing sticks. Morris dance is a fun combination of performance and social dance. It can be graceful and powerful, precise and athletic, serious and goofy.

MTM has a long history with Tapestry. Many of you know Ed Stern as a teacher of International, Scottish and English Country dances. Ed is one of the founding members of MTM and has been an active leader in the group for 35 years. Tom Barnes, who did most of the construction on the current Tapestry building, has also been a longtime member of MTM. Ted Hodapp, well known as a Contra caller, continues as an active member of MTM despite living in Washington, DC the past several years. Many other MTM'ers are also active members of Tapestry. And of course you can see us at practice at Tapestry on Tuesday nights most of the year.

The BBC recently interviewed several Minnesota Morris dancers on their Americana broadcast. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011j43n#synopsis (have patience, they get to the Morris dancers at about 23 minutes 40 seconds).

MTM has a website at

http://www.minnesotatraditionalmorris.org/index.htm

If you want to see us, we have some upcoming gigs:

June 25 – Menomonie, Wisconsin, various places around town

July 4 - Edina parade and Richfield parade

July 16 – Morgan Creek Vineyards

http://www.morgancreekvineyards.com/

Weekends August 20 to October 2 – Minnesota Renaissance Festival http://www.renaissancefest.com/MRF/

There is a large Morris and English dance community in the Twin Cities. MTM is a men's group focused on Cotswold Morris; but there are several other teams in town providing opportunities for everyone in various English folk dance styles including Cotswold Morris, Border Morris, Long Sword, Rapper Sword, and Clogging.

For more information on Minnesota Traditional Morris or these other groups contact:

Temple Blackwood

Email:

Cell Phone: 651-894-3683

Home Phone: 651-699-0598