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Monday, December 4, 2006
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How to do... Irish set dancing
Duncan tries to get to grips with Irish set dancing with partner Serena Day. (6AL1031711) Picture: ANDY LAITHWAITE
AN estimated three in WHEN you think of Irish dancing, the image tends to come up of Michael Flatley staring out into space, arms clamped firmly by his side as his flash feet create a seemingly unstoppable rhythm on the stage.
When I joined the city’s Irish set dancers in the function room at Swiss Cottage, in Grove Street, Woodston, I found that there is much more to Irish dancing than the type made popular by the show Riverdance – but it is no less energetic.
A lot of Irish set dancing revolves around swings and reels, which all have to be done at speed and in very close proximity to your partner, while trying to avoid everyone else crossing the floor around you. It is surprising how fast it goes, and how much of a sweat you build up.
Like American set dancing, each dance involves eight people, four sets of partners stood in a square shape before the madness begins.
Throughout the night I was assisted by keen Irish dancer Kathy Mabbutt, who had invited me down, and my regular dance partner
Serena Day – who I have now met at four different dance classes.
Club organisers Anne Keogh and Helen O’Connell took us through a few basic moves before the real work started.
I couldn’t believe how fast the music seemed to go, and how much we had to move, crossing the floor time and again to complete our little parts of the dance.
There was no room for shyness here – the further away you tried to keep from your partner the harder it was to do the moves.
Helen told me that many of the original Irish set dances were carried out in a space no bigger than a fireside hearth so it was important to keep your partner close – if only to make it easy for yourself.
The thing that left me dazed was the amount of swings and turns you had to make in a short period of time – I was left feeling quite dizzy by the end of most moves, only to have to carry on into another section of the dance.
A regular move was the house move, which involved spinning your partner around the set while trying not to crash into any of the other six dancers in your group.
The one move that many people seemed to dread was doubling, which featured in the Borlin Set dance. The closest you could get to describing it is the move drunken football fans do in a small space when their team scores – grabbing your partner in a close embrace and both of you spinning around like a spinning top, while moving in a large circle at the same time.
Mixed in with a lot of the close moves were dance steps like the polka, and slides as in the last dance the Black Valley Jig Set.
Before long I was sweating like I was in the middle of a workout, and despite it being one of the coldest nights so far this year, many of the other dancers were taking off layers as the heat in the room built up.
By its very nature it is a sociable activity – you meet new people very easily, and there is time to sit out of the dances and chat.
The group, which meets every Tuesday at the Swiss Cottage, was started in Peterborough a long time ago, but was only resurrected six years ago by Anne and Helen.
Helen said: “We feel it should be fun. It is great as a social club. Although we dance to CDs, a lot of us are musicians too who attend regular Sunday music sessions in Charters, off Town Bridge.”
She added that the group didn’t do demonstrations or competitions, it was much more about having fun as a social activity. When I was there, the group was just planning its Christmas meal.
It was a great night, I was left feeling exhausted but elated – perhaps a side effect of all that spinning – but I know I was smiling a lot too that night.