Red Dragon in the Marche of Tirnewydd is one of my favorite yearly events although I'm not sure why precisely. I imagine most of the fun comes from day tripping with close friends. There is often stories, many of which can be repeated... others, not so much. I will spare the details to protect the innocent or the guilty.
One highlight of the event is the annual dance competition sponsored by THL Felice Debbage and Sir Cellach macChormac. To provide a little background, the first year Ginevra and I studied hard for Gracca Amorosa. By studying hard I mean talking a lot about it prior to and doing very little due to intimidation, then deciphering the steps from the Terpsichore handbook and finger-puppet dancing over lunch while trying to watching a video on my iPhone.
The second year, we vowed to study ahead with Candida Luna, but didn't have the music and were otherwise busy with life.
This third year, the dance was Alta Regina and as I'm sure you can imagine, we SRSLY vowed to go over it at least once, but it didn't happen. Life interrupted Ginevra's trip, but I went ahead as planned.
Mistress Alina was instructing this time as THL Felice was under doctor's orders to stay off her twinkle toes. The dance was similar enough to Gracca Amorosa and La Castellana to throw me every so often with the muscle memory. Two reprisa followed by two trabuchetti means you spezzato then cadenza without question, right? No... not in Alta Regina!
While far from perfect, I was able to compete later that day with the lovely Baroness Angharad ferch Tangwystl as my partner and we earned second place!
Renaissance Dance Database: Alta Regina