What's a potato?
A contra dance has four to eight figures. They go with the music. Figures change either at the boundaries between parts, or half way through a part.
Contra-dance callers, issue their calls before the musical phrase that goes with the figure of the dance. If the next move is "swing your partner," and couples will swing for an entire A1 -- for eight, full beats -- then the caller needs to tell folks that before that A1 starts. All the calls come right before the next musical phrase starts, so the dancers can know what to do for that musical phrase.
(Square dances are far more fluid. You'll need potatoes for them, too, but I'll focus on contras because they're so clear-cut.)
Potatoes are measures before the dance begins to get the dancers' attention and to give the caller time to issue the call for the first figure. "With your neighbor, gypsy!"
Fiddlers do the potatoes. A classic potato is just a Nashville shuffle: dah diddy. Two beats. Four potatoes is eight beats of shuffle. If you're a music reader, that's two bars. Eight potatoes is twice that, or four measures. They're like pickups, but they're pickup measures instead of pickup beats
Longer initial calls, like "Long lines go forward and back," fill up full eight beats, so a long intro works better. The first four potatoes say, "Here comes the first call." The next four are musical accompaniment to that call.
However, if the first call is "Swing below," a pretty typical start for a contra, then four potatoes is plenty.
You'd think that that'd mean callers would tell you how many potatoes based on the first call. Mostly not. Most callers will ask for four, no matter what the call, because that's what they've seen other callers do, and their opening call will lap over into the first figure. Relax. Give 'em four. The most important thing is to keep the caller comfy. The dancers are concentrating on their partners, so they'll do fine, too. Only you will notice.
You'll hear two good alternatives to potatoes.
One alternative takes experience and coordination with the caller; you'll hear it with high-end touring contra band/caller combos, like Wild Asparagus with George Marshall. In this one, the band starts slowly and quietly while the caller's teaching. There's usually a second walk-through of the dance, so the band can start during that, then by the time the dance comes around to the top again, they can launch into the tune, full-bore. There's no, "Okay, everybody back home to your original places, and let's try it with the music."
The other is to lead off with the end of the tune. The last four measures of B2 gives you an eight-potato lead-in.
The call is like words to the music. To launch into Yankee Doodle, you play the notes for this:
Mind the music and the step, andWith the girls be handy.As you're playing "With the girls be," the caller's saying, "On your cor-ner." As you play "han-dy," the caller says, "allemand left."
...
This way's uncommon, but easy enough that you should try it from time to time. In particular, jigs don't lend themselves well to potato-y intros, so if you're playing a set of jigs, or a jig-to-reel set, start this way.
