Antony Heywood was born and spent his first decade in Egypt where his father was teaching. The family returned to England and Antony grew up in Birkenhead.
He went up to Clare College, Cambridge where he achieved a degree in Physics and sang with the 'Clare Canaries' (though probably not folk songs!). (An odd coincidence is that Clare College Library holds Cecil Sharp's fair copy manuscripts). Following his graduation he worked for the Cambridge Instrument Company, where he built the first commercial scanning electron microscope. After the company was taken over he moved to London in 1963, and in 1965 he joined Philips and was married. Threatened with redundancy in 1976, he and his family moved to Germany, working for Philips there for two years, and then to the Netherlands, where he continued to work for Philips till his retirement.
Antony first danced locally in Birkenhead while still a schoolboy in the early 1950s during the Square Dance craze, after Princess Elizabeth had been photographed square dancing in Canada. When he went up to Cambridge he joined the University country dance club, The Round, of which he was Chairman 1958/59, and the Cambridge Morris Men, of which he was Squire 1961/62. While in Cambridge he took part in the EFDSS Albert Hall festivals for the Cambridgeshire District of the Society, and was inspired to join the EFDSS by Douglas and Helen Kennedy at a weekend they ran c.1960. He met Ethyl Anderson back in Birkenhead during University holidays.
After the move to London Marjorie Fennessy invited Antony to join her demonstration team the Whirligigs, with whom he danced until their closure. This brought him into direct contact with Pat Shaw, who used to try out his researched dances and new compositions with the Whirligigs. During this period, Antony also danced with London Folk, a group which provided the main core of dancers at the Albert Hall Festivals. Morris dancing was with Greensleeves, with whom he still dances after over fifty years' membership.
Living and working in the Netherlands from 1978 allowed Antony to resume folk dance by joining the Helmond Morris Men and the NVS, the Dutch society for English Folk Dance. He was on the NVS committee for many years, and after retirement he was Chairman for four years. He was made an honorary member eight years ago.
In his time with Philips the company gave him the opportunity to enter the relatively new field of desktop publishing, providing him with the necessary professional training. This has had significant consequences for the world of English Folk Dance. His first incursion was to produce, in conjunction with Marjorie Fennessy, a new edition of 'New Wine in Old Bottles', Pat Shaw's collection of 54 dances composed for the NVS to old Dutch tunes. This was followed by a new edition of Cor Hogendijk's first book of dances, 'English or Double Dutch'. His next publication was a fresh edition of 'Holland as seen in the English Country Dance', a collection of C18th/19th dances with Dutch connotations in their titles found and published by Pat Shaw for the NVS.
While I was in Cambridge Antony suggested that he and I should enter a dance for the EFDS Jubilee dance competition (won by Freda Burford with 'Jubilee Roundabout'). At about that time a dancer in Cambridge produced a tune called Westminster Hall which he thought deserved a dance, so Antony and I duly composed a dance to it. Many years later I discovered the tune was by Henry Purcell and had already been published with a dance in 1698. These first dance compositions led eventually to Antony's two volumes of dances, 'An Enchanted Place' and 'Dance to the Music of Time'.
Antony offered to typeset a collection of dances to tunes by Henry Purcell which Marjorie Fennessy and I were preparing: this resulted in 'Purcell's Dancing Master'. So when I was approached about producing a new edition of 'The Fallibroome Collection' for the Society I immediately asked Antony to do the typesetting. He has recently done the three Pat Shaw volumes comprising 'Pat Shaw Reminiscences' by Brenda Godrich, and 'The Pat Shaw Collection' and 'Another Look at Playford', both edited by Marjorie Fennessy with input from others.
For something over twenty years Antony has been editor and compositor of 'Dansnieuws' the NVS bi-monthly magazine. Recently he has been intimately involved in the 'Pat Shaw Legacy Group', for whom he developed a web site, initially to advertise the three Pat Shaw volumes he had typeset for the group. He rapidly expanded the remit of the web site which has since been taken over by someone else.
Antony is a longstanding member of The Friends of Cecil Sharp House. He is not only a dancer, but also a teacher of Morris, Sword and Country Dance, having taught in the Netherlands, the UK, Germany and Belgium. In 1985 he formed a Country Dance group 'Rural Felicity' in the Netherlands, which he ran and taught for thirty years.
Probably Antony's greatest contribution to folk dance internationally is his dance database, barndances.org.uk/Antony. This contains over 16,000 entries of English, Contra and Square dances, and is widely used in the UK, USA and elsewhere. It lists dances, their basic figures, their composers and any available recordings, and many ways of searching for individual items. He has my own unqualified admiration for this tremendous piece of work.
On a personal note I first met Antony at the Cambridge Morris Men and the Round Country Dance Club when I was working in Cambridge for the year 1960/61. When I needed new digs he invited me to share a flat he and a friend had, and we became good friends from that moment on. In 1965 he invited me to act as Best Man at his wedding, an office I was happy to fulfil. This subsequently led to an invitation through him in 1966 for me to join the Whirligigs.
For his services to English Folk Dance, his publishing in that field, and his service to various English Folk Dance and Song organizations, Antony Heywood is a very worthy recipient of the Gold Badge of the English Folk Dance and Song Society.
Nicolas M. Broadbridge.