A sort of manifesto in the April 96 Folk Roots reads:
The English Country Dance Band .... feels it is time to restate some of the original thinking behind the formation of OSB - the Old Swan Band - at a time when many bands are playing fusion/experimental material with a lack of appreciation of the basis from which they are working
The responsibility for upholding an "English Country Dance" style when the popular tide (in English Ceilidh at least) is towards the eclectic and the frisson of wider influences is a heavy burden.
ECBD keep a tight focus on their material with the result that, at the end of a Ceilidh you are left with a slight suspicion that you've been dancing 'through a keyhole'. That there's a loose and free dance style there, somewhere, but you haven't quite seen it...
The CD, Barn Dance, is reminiscent of the Old Swan Bands and comes with a useful range of dance descriptions on it - as the cover says it has "full instructions inside" - and has more of a feel of teaching aid than a CD you'd put on just to listen to.
Dances described are Three around Three, Nottingham Swing, Haste to the Wedding, Soldiers Joy, Galopede, Cumberland Square Eight, Steamboat, Heel and Toe Polka, Sir Roger de Coverley, Circle Waltz, Dashing White Sergent, Pride of Dingle, The Triumph and Circassian Circle