This page is an historical archive, and therefore is out of date and will not be updated. Please visit our homepage at http://mit.edu/fdc for current information about the MIT Folk Dance Club.

Quick Index

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About The Club

IAP Special Events

Club Email Lists

Special Events

How to Find a Room We're Scheduled in

Organizational meetings of the Club

Links to related dance sites

About The Club

Sunday night International Folk Dancing meets every week from 8:00 to 10:30 pm, almost always on the 2nd floor of the Student Center:

Sunday Dates (8-10:30 pm)	Building/Floor	Room	Notes
September 2, 2018	Kresge Auditorium basement	Kresge Rehearsal Room A	Beginner's Night!
September 9, 2018	Student Center 2nd Floor	Lobdell Dining Hall	Beginner's Night!
September 16 - October 7, 2018	Student Center 2nd Floor	Sala de Puerto Rico	9/16: Live music by Rakiya!
October 14 & 21, 2018	Kresge Auditorium basement	Kresge Rehearsal Room B	10/14: Live music by Rakiya!
October 28, 2018	Student Center 2nd Floor	Sala de Puerto Rico	Live music by the Cambridge Folk Orchestra! The final international dance as a student group!

Note: All events after November 1, 2018 are subject to cancellation or location change. More information will be posted soon.

Note: All events after November 1, 2018 are subject to cancellation or location change. More information will be posted soon.

On two or three Tuesdays per month, the Contra Dance for All meets in various locations from 8:00 to 10:30 pm (check the schedule for dates and locations). Live music every time! Beginners are always welcome and are encouraged to come early.

IAP Special Events

The MITFDC gives classes and workshops as part of MIT's Independent Activities Period each January.
Check out our IAP offerings for January 2018.

Club Email Lists

• International Folk (Sunday nights): Send a blank email to fdc-international-subscribe[at]mit[dot]edu
  or fill out this form. You will receive an e-mail requesting confirmation.

  Your email address:
  Your name (optional):

  
  
• Contra Dancing (two or three Tuesdays per month): Send a blank email to fdc-contra-dance-subscribe[at]mit[dot]edu , or fill out this form. You will receive an e-mail requesting confirmation.

  Your email address:
  Your name (optional):

  
  
• Israeli (Wednesdays): Send a blank email to mitfdc-isra-subscribe[at]yahoogroups[dot]com
  or fill out this form. You will receive an email requesting confirmation.

  Your email address:

Special Events

Annual Israeli Dance Marathon
The Christmas Eve Israeli Dance Marathon takes place every year on or about Christmas Eve. We start at 6 pm and dance until about 4 am.

December 24, 2018 (Mon.) - 39th annual Christmas Eve marathon at KI The 39th Annual Israeli Dancing Marathon will be held at an off-campus location on Monday, December 24, 2018. We will be dancing in Epstein Hall, the large wood-floored room on the upper level of Congregation Kehillath Israel in Brookline. Food!! Fun!! Large wooden dance floor! All request dancing, all night! Congregation Kehillath Israel 384 Harvard Street, Brookline MA [map] Admission $15 with pre-registration; $20 at the door (Children 13-17, seniors, all students with ID -- only $10! Children under 13 -- free!) For more information, or to volunteer, please contact us at: marathon [at] bostonisraelidance [dot] com

Beginner's Nights are for people who haven't done much dancing before and want to learn some and for more experienced dancers who want to practice the basics. In other words, they are for everyone. You need no prior experience and you don't need a partner. Beginner's Nights for all 3 nights of dancing occur in September and January each year.

The Israel Folkdance Festival of Boston takes place each year in March, in Kresge Auditorium on the MIT campus. The next festival will be on Sunday March 10, 2019. The show includes performances by dance ensembles from far and near. Visit http://www.bostonfestival.org for more information and to order tickets.

Where We Meet

These are the locations where we usually meet. Click on a location to see it on a campus map.

1. The Stratton Student Center (Building W20). It is located at 84 Mass. Ave., directly across the street from the main entrance to MIT. La Sala de Puerto Rico and Lobdell Dining Hall are located on the second floor. Rooms W20-407, W20-491, and our club office W20-423 are located on the fourth floor.

2. Lobby 13. Can be accessed from either Vassar St. or the Infinite Corridor (go in the main MIT entrance at 77 Mass Ave and turn north at Lobby 10).

3. Kresge Auditorium. Kresge is the glass and metal dome with a turquoise roof, set back on a plaza at 48 Massachusetts Avenue (across the street from the main MIT entrance). Rehearsal Rooms A and B are located in the basement.

Parking

Club Meetings

Organizational club meetings usually take place once a year in early May.

Contact the club officers at fdc[at]mit[dot]edu to find out about future meetings.

Links to other folk dance resources

International Folk, Contra Dancing, and Other kinds:

The Folk Arts Center of New England home page, including their calendar Folk Dancing 'Round Boston.

New England Folk Festival Association (NEFFA) runs a folk festival each April in Mansfield, MA, as well as a contra dance each Thursday night at the Scout House in Concord, MA. (This dance was formerly located at the VFW in west Cambridge, and hopes to move back there now that the city has rebuilt it as a youth/community center.)

Country Dance Society, Boston Centre (Contra and English Country dancing.)

BIDA (Porter Square, Cambridge), the Jamaica Plain Gender Free Contra Dance, and the West Cambridge Fourth Saturday Dance are the other contra/traditional square dances in the city.

contradancelinks.com, a comprehensive page of links to other Contra Dances around the world.

Larry Denenberg's Beginner's Catechism page

The Cambridge Folk Orchestra plays at various folk dances in the Boston area, and occasionally plays at MIT at our Sunday night international folk dances.

The MIT Folk Dance Club Songbook, a compilation of lyrics of the songs in our record collection.

Arthur Saltzman has posted FDC photos and movies from the 1960s.

The Tuesday Night Revival is an advanced Balkan dance group that used to dance at MIT, and now holds dances about once a month in Arlington on a Friday or Saturday.

Zdravets is a local Bulgarian band which hosts a dance once a month in Newton Corner (formerly in Arlington).

Balkan Music Night is a concert and dance party which occurs each year in March, in Concord, MA.

The Dance Gypsy is a calendar of contra and other folk dances throughout the U.S., focusing on New England.

Israeli Folk Dancing:

Israeli Folk Dance in Boston, including Sunday night Israeli Dancing at Temple Emeth in Chestnut Hill (formerly located at Harvard Hillel), and Monday night dancing at Congregation Kehillath Israel in Brookline.

israelidance.com, which includes a test to see if you are a true folk dance addict and a session-finder, in case you're thinking of moving and want to see if there's dancing there first.

Comments on this home page and other subjects are welcome.
Send mail to fdc[at]mit[dot]edu .