Square dancers cut a rug in Beijing(2)

Meanwhile, square dancing is, and always has been, a respectable and modest way to let loose and socialize. At a square dance, couples split off into pairs and change partners throughout the evening, if they like, while listening to a caller who tells them what step comes next.

Square dancing is also popular in the streets, where it has taken on some distinctly local incarnations.

On warm summer nights in Beijing, it's hard to walk through any neighborhood or park without hearing bass-heavy electronic music pumping out of a boom box with the volume turned all the way up and someone barking directions into a microphone.

The manic pulsing and thumping of these beats can cut through even the balmiest air like a knife through butter, and one could be forgiven for assuming that the people dancing to it might be hard-partying young people, raging hard into the night.

In fact, it's not Beijing's young and hip -- it's their parents and grandparents.

Hawke is quick to point out that the Hutong Yellow Weasels' shows have a lot in common with these groups of square-dancing grannies, though they're able to draw a younger crowd to their hootenannies.

"Kids, you know, they feel dorky going to dance in the park with their parents," he says. "So, we're doing pretty much the same thing, but they feel less dorky about joining in."