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Background Information
There is considerable interest in the procedures to follow if a person wants to write a dance. Hopefully the following information will help guide you through the maze of myths surrounding the writing and publishing of a round dance routine.
To begin with, let's separate music into "Pop" versus "Round Dance" labels, since the rules regarding choreography differ for each classification. For Round Dance labels, the rules are consistent among most labels. If you wish to write a dance to music on a Windsor, A & F Music [Belco], Hi Hat, Merry-Go-Round, Private Stock, or Grenn label, you must first ask for and receive permission from the respective company before you write a dance. All round dance producers have fairly strict guidelines regarding how often the same piece of music may have a dance routine written to it, and they generally adhere to their guidelines. If a dance is written without their permission, they will generally not supply records to the retail outlets [i.e., Palomino] which, in effect, kills the dance.
Once a person is granted permission to write a dance, he/she has a certain amount of time in which to get a cue sheet prepared and submitted to the record company. The companies then submit the cue sheet to a "panel". Once a final cue sheet has been agreed upon, the record company will either re-release the old record [if they have a lot on hand], or will repress under a different number. Once the record is available for release, the record company will handle the marketing [advertising, sending to selected round dance instructors across the nation, etc.].
The exception to the above procedure is Hoctor, who will inform you if they have a supply of the record on hand and will verbally encourage you [and anyone else who may call them] to go ahead and write a dance. They do not control who is writing to their music, thus, several people could conceivably be writing dances to the same music at the same time. This helps nobody.
Pop labels require no authorization from anyone to write a dance routine. Therefore, good pop music records generally wind up having numerous dances written to the same piece of music. Also, the supply of records can dry up almost as quickly as it became available since the record companies can pull existing stock at any time for any reason. It is always a good idea to check with Palomino or Collectables before writing a dance to a Pop label to confirm availability. Even when confirmed, the supply can become unavailable the next day.
If you write a dance to a Pop label, you will have to handle your own marketing. A record and cue sheet may be sent to the following magazines for publication:
Top Hat Cue Sheet Service Cue Sheet Magazine
638 Realm Ct. W. Fran and Jim Kropf
Odenton, MD 21113-1559 4015 Marzo Street
San Diego, CA 92154
In addition, you may want to send a cue sheet of your dance to the record supplier and a record plus a cue sheet to any round dance leaders around the country who you feel may want to teach it in their travels.
Revised June 2000
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Note: The formatting of this document, especially the cue sheet examples, may not be exactly like the Cue Sheet Writing Guidelines published by ROUNDALAB. However, the essential characteristics of the Guidelines as suggested by ROUNDALAB are present and should provide sufficient information to write a cue sheet according to those Guidelines. Hard copies of the Guidelines may be purchased from ROUNDALAB .