Note: Documentation of music has been through Aura Lipski's website, www.israelidances.com, a must read and resource for Israeli dances.

The local Philadelphia regional dancers are aware that Andrea Wallach has relocated to the Southwestern Vermont area, specifically Rutland. Several Philadelphians would know this to be an area somewhat to the east of Fort Ticonderoga. Ticonderoga was the scene of several clashes between British and colonial forces during the Revolutionary war. Even before that Ticonderoga was the scene of battles during the French and Indian war between the forces supporting the British influenced area of North America versus the French influenced areas.

Even by the time of the revolutionary war, Vermont was not a colony. It was contested land between the New Hampshire, New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut colonies. Several of these colonies had even begun to provide deeds for property in this contested land. One group, the Green Mountain boys - and Rutland stands in the shadows of the Green Mountains - led by Ethan Allen fought the attempts of New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut to appropriate this area. By force and intimidation, they supported what was known as the New Hampshire grants - property authorized by the colony of New Hampshire.

As colonial public opinion turned against England, the Green Mountain boys also turned their attention to fighting British influence in the area. Ethan Allen today is considered a Revolutionary War hero and his efforts led to Vermont statehood in 1791. As the 14th state, Vermont was the first state created beyond the original 13 colonies turned States.

The borders of this state are interesting enough to become a script on this web site one day. The famous Morses line is perhaps the most interesting of the State's boundaries. Several treaties between the new US government and British authorities set the 45th parallel as the border between Vermont and what would become the Canadian province of Quebec. However problems in determining the 45th parallel led to various interpretations of the border until finalized in the Twentieth century. The border itself became known as the Morses line when the US government established a customs (and no doubt immigration) center designated as the Morses center at a certain point along the border and the name was extrapolated to designate the border.

Multiple instances of buildings and structures straddling both borders are in existance and are celebrated as an example of the cooperation between the two countries. And, think about this: the two areas, The US and what would become Canada, were bitter enemies for the first 60 years or so of the existance of this country. Now, best of friends and neighbors. It shows you what can eventually be done if perseverence on a peaceful solution is pursued.

Let's return to the origins of this CD. On arrival to her new neighborhood, Andrea discovered that the Rutland area lacked a class in one of her favorite pastimes, Israeli dancing. So she set out to rectify that situation. She gave a demonstration of Israeli dance during one Oneg Shabbat recently and is making plans as this is written to start a twice monthly beginner session in that area. She contacted this web site to inquire whether we could produce a CD for her students and using her suggestions, the CD described below was created. Besides shipping a version of this CD (Andrea's version is slightly different than described below) this web site has produced several batches that are being distributed to Philadelphia based sessions.

On the tableau below we have attempted to provide the dance name, translation, musicians, date made into a dance and the choreographer. We have used a bluish scheme below as the Vermont flag over the years has had a blue base although of different RGB combinations. The last two columns provide links to the dance videos and music videos(pertaining to the musicians' rendition) on Youtube. If we have a still from the video, we've included the picture or you will see the designation "Dance video" or "music video"

The kicker for the Vermonter CD is "Keep Holding On" by Avril Lavigne. Our editors thought that this music examplified Andrea's journey to Vermont. You might recognize the music for another reason. It was the theme song for the movie, Eragon, that came out in 2006. This movie is an adaptation of the first volume of the the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini, who himself is noteworthy having started this novel when he was 15. The novel came out in 2001.