Irish Set Dancing

Subject: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 21 Jun 07 - 06:51 PM

Are there any Mudcatters out there set dancers. It's great music, great excersise, great fun, in fact altogether great craic.

Details of classes can be found in Set Dancing News. I can't get the web page up at the moment but when it comes back I'll do a blue clicky.

If you've never seen set dancing then click on:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82Lx6qsHM8Q

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 11:55 AM

You'll also see more on the subject in the "Lyr req:Thread of 1000 Dances" thread.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 01:30 PM

Am I to believe that there is not one set dancer out there, surely not.

As promised, 'The Set Dancing News' web site is here:

http://www.setdancingnews.net/
Come on now, find your nearest venue and get along there, if your eight or eighty, you'll not regret it.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 01:45 PM

Incidentally, you don't have to be Irish, I'm not.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Dr Price
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 04:53 PM

I saw the Mizen Set Dancers from West Cork at the Tredegar House Festival in Newport, Gwent, last May - they were great! A crowd of us went to Schull, West Cork, on a trip arranged by Bertie and Annie Moran, two of the Mizen Set Dancers. One of a good many high spots was when Gwerinwyr Gwent (our Welsh dance team) danced a display at a full-to-bursting set dance - John Coakley, ex-Boys Of The Lough, was in the set dance group of musicians.

We've been to The Gathering festival at Killarney at least four times. Apart from Altan, Sharon Shannon, Nollaig Casey and Artie McGlynn, Dervish, Noel Hill, Jackie Daly and a whole army of heart-stopping and brilliant artists, a thousand set dancers immerse themselves in a weekend of workshops, instructions, ceilis, everything that a set dancer could want. You must go!

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 05:31 PM

A group of us from Bristol were at Killarney the last two years, if you went to the ceilis, we may even have been in the same set.

We're great friends with Timmy McCarthy the dance teacher from Ballyvourney. If you've not been to one of his workshops, don't miss next time. He's great with the jokes and stories, and he plays the box as he is teaching. Oh, and he's passionate about Polka Sets.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 05:36 PM

I've just seen Joe Offers note about Youtube. For those who can't get it, the link in the first posting showed dancers in Kilrush dancing the Cashel set in the town square during the Mrs Crotty weekend, an annual event.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 11:21 PM

Sorry, forgot to mention I'm a bit of a set dancer, albeit part-time these days.

As you say it's immensely enjoyable & very good exercise, also a great way of socialising.

If you haven't come across it, there's a very good book by Larry Lynch - 'Set Dances of Ireland - Tradition & Evolution', which tells you just about everything you need to know on the subject. He collected sets from old-timers and tells you the difference between how the sets used to be danced and how they are danced today, often influenced (today) by competitions and their rigid style of conformity and precision!

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Mr Red
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 05:02 AM

The problem E-Ceilidh dancers have with Irish set dancing and French & Breton dancing is that English dances and the music lend themselves to leaping and bopping. I do Set dances as part of an E-C event and do French/Breton & Cajun events but the tendency is to do large movements and the tempo and phrasing are not suited to the English tradition - as currently exercised by E-Ceilidh afficianados. It is a physiology/mecahnical dynamics thing. Think first order resonant systems.

Small steps usually end-up big and tiring.

Does the Priddy Set Dancing week-end still run?


Yes there is a long tradition of English Social Dancing and dances - with plenty of continuity. But to distiguish events favouring keen regulars from the PTA "should be a hoot" kind of offering ceilidh is the word preferrably E-Ceilidh.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 06:56 AM

It's more of a winter thing, usually (oddly enough), with people going out on a weekday night to classes and dances.

Mr Red is right about the large movements. Set dances - which are kind of like fast quadrilles - are designed so that large numbers of people can dance in a small area. In the old days you'd have two sets - 16 people - dancing in a kitchen, "around the floor and mind the dresser", while those resting sat around the edges cautiously consuming cups of tea and scones. So it should be easy to dance a set in a six-foot square.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Mo the caller
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 05:04 PM

The small squares lead to the joy of it. The teamwork.
When everything goes right, that is. One mistake and you're leaping around trying to get out of the way and back to where you should be.

And, despite the ads at the bottom of the page, this is NOT the same as River dance in fancy dresses, nor yet Bridge of Athlone etc.

Learning Irish sets, and something about their history helped me understand other square dances that I'd been dancing for ages (American, English)

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 12:17 PM

Refresh

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,maire-aine
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 12:36 PM

I did a little bit, before my knee gave out. But I preferred ceili dancing. In the Detroit, Michigan area, you can check out www.detroitirish.org.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 12:39 PM

Looks a bit like Scottish country dancing to me.
G.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Folkiedave
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 01:24 PM

My wife loves Irish set dancing and she is scottish (!!) but it may have buggered up her hip she thinks.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Fibula Mattock
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 03:50 PM

Yes me! Love it. Curious now, is Rog Peek maybe actually Roger from St Bons? If so, hello, it's Kate, the Norn Irish one wot moved from Bristol to London.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 05:50 PM

Scottish country dancing is more formal, but many of the dances are similar.

Pity there aren't videos around of some of my favourite dances: the High-Caul Cap, the Connemara Set...

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 07:11 PM

Hello Kate, or is it Fibula?
Small world isn't it? We certainly miss you at St. Bon's

Stepnanie says hello.....she also said "somebody else with nothing better to do". She's not to impressed with all this mudcatting, she thinks I should be doing something 'more useful' silly person she is.

I'll remember you to all the Bristol set dancers on Sunday.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 07:21 PM

By the way Fibula, if you click on these two, you'll see Barbara and Seamus dancing at Kilrush.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUAF9N9yzEc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltHJZMJs4Xk

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Fibula Mattock
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 05:13 AM

Ahh, lovely Roger! Makes me want to dance. I was doing a wee bit of dancing at my cousin's wedding last weekend in Norn Iron. In fact, I was a strawboy for one of the dances - unbeliveably difficult to dance when you can't see what you're doing, and I'd no dancing shoes with me, and it was the Clare Lancers, which as you know I can never remember where I'm going, and I was being a man, so that made it twice as hard. :)

Do say hi to Stephanie for me, and a big hello to everyone else at St Bons too. I'd love to get back for an evening, but I'm gearing up for 6 weeks of driving to Mongolia, so that's my summer gone.

I'm not on here that much these days because this place takes over your life, but if we could incorporate set dancing into next year's Loughstock Mudcat gathering in Portaferry it'd be amazing!

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 28 Jun 07 - 12:13 PM

There'll be a lot of set dancing in the small town of Miltown Malbay, Co.Clare, Ireland from 7th-15th July when the Willie Clancy Summer School takes place - classes & ceilis galore! There's info on the 'Set Dancing News' website:
http://www.setdancingnews.com

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 28 Jun 07 - 12:20 PM

Oops, sorry, that should be:
http://www.setdancingnews.net

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: black walnut
Date: 28 Jun 07 - 05:12 PM

I tried Irish set dancing. It was a riot. Very fun but wore out both brain and body pretty quickly!

~b.w.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 28 Jun 07 - 08:34 PM

Oooh, the Clare Lancers, love that dance - the way the lines form one way, then the same people form lines going the other way.

They sometimes run a week of set dancing classes in Oideas Gael
in Donegal.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: Rog Peek
Date: 01 Jul 07 - 09:07 AM

Went set dancing last night in Sharon & Mick's house. Maximum 6ft. square for each of the two sets. The term 'dance around the house' used in set dancing really means something when you're actually doing it. Thanks Sharon & Mick.

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 01 Jul 07 - 11:31 PM

Just enjoyed doing an impromptu Caledonian set in the Market Place, Ennis, Co.Clare at the Ennis Street Fest which happened yesterday for the first time.

Bumped into a set dance teacher who I know (Dick O'Connell) and he very quickly managed to get a set of 8 people together like magic! He knew some of the musicians & managed to get them to play for us, they finished on time at the end of each figure of the set, this doesn't always happen!

That's what it's all about, spontaineous enjoyment & the crowd enjoyed it too, it really added something to the atmosphere.

http://www.ennisstreetfestival.com

Subject: RE: Irish Set Dancing
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 05 Jul 07 - 07:52 AM

Refresh