19th Annual Celebration

October 3rd & 4th, 2009

Bartley Ranch Regional Park

Reno, Nevada

Dancers

Celtic dancing ranges from the country dances that grew out of the popular barn dances and court dances in Ireland, Wales and Scotland to the more athletic competitive dancing of Irish step dancing and Highland dance.  Celtic Celebration will have dance groups demonstrating aspects of the dances on both Saturday and Sunday.

Dunsmuir Scottish Dancers

The Dunsmuir Scottish Dancers are dedicated to keeping alive the spirit and form of Scottish dances, old and new. Their repertoire spans four centuries of dance tradition. Period costumes and musical stylings bring the past to the present.  They offer a wide variety of Scottish dancing. You will enjoy lively country dance reels, as well as elegant strathspeys. They perform works from the 18th Century, as well as dances created by contemporary devisers and are accompanied by a small band of musicians.

Silver State Scottish Country Dancers

The Silver State Scottish Country Dancers are affiliated with the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society in Edinburgh.  That’s official but less exciting and important than the fact that they really enjoy dancing.  The group was started in Reno by Martha Norrie, a fine Scottish lady, and has grown in number of dancers and classes. They now have classes on Wednesdays and Thursdays and are always looking for new members.  Ask a group member for details.

Blanchette School of Irish Dance

 Check the dance schedule for performance times for all dancers.

Irish Step Dancing

Stepdancing as a modern form is descended directly from sean nós ("old style") stepdancing.  White there are  many forms of stepdancing in Ireland, such as the Connemara style stepdancing, the style most familiar is the Munster, or southern, form, which has been formalized by An Coimisiún le Rincí Gaelacha, which first met in 1930. An Coimisiún was formed from a directorate of the Gaelic League during the Modern Revival.

Irish stepdance has very precise rules about what one may and may not do and when, but within these rules there is almost infinite room for variety and innovation. Thus, Irish stepdancing is a vibrant and constantly evolving art form. As a solo form, stepdances fall into two categories: Soft shoe and hard shoe.  The reel, slip jig, hornpipe and jig are dances as well as types of Irish traditional music.  The hornpipe is a hard shoe dance as is the treble jig.  The reel, slip jig, single and jigs are soft shoe dances.  The dances that have the distinctive tap sound are hard shoe, whereas the soft shoe is more like ballet slippers.  The other distinguishing feature of Irish stepdancing is that the dancers keep their arms by their sides to draw attention to the footwork. 

Traditional costume for the ladies and girls feature colorful, beautiful designs from the Book of Kells and other ancient Irish books.  The lovely, bouncy curls of the girls' hairstyle is also part of the tradition and does count in competition.  The lads are more likely to be wearing kilts or slacks. 

For more about Irish stepdancing and its history, go to this article at Wikipedia.com.

Scottish Country Dancing

Scottish Country Dancing is the ballroom dance of Scotland.  It consists of energetic jigs and reels and graceful strathspeys.  Generally taught and performed with the guidelines set forth by the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society (RSCDS),  Scottish country dancing, "SCD" or "reeling" is a form of social dance involving groups of mixed couples of dancers tracing progressive patterns according to a predetermined choreography. SCD is often considered a type of folk dancing although this is not strictly true - it derives from the courtly dances of the Renaissance and, as a form of ballroom dancing, predates the more modern styles of the quadrille as well as couple dances like the waltz.

Most often done in organized formations referred to as "sets", Scottish country dancing consists of three or four couples, but some dances call for larger sets of five, six or even more couples.  The usual set shape is "longwise"---each man opposite his partner with all the men in a line facing a similar line of women. The leftmost man and his partner are called the "first" or "top" couple, and sets are generally formed such that first couple is closest to the source of music. In larger rooms several sets form a longer line running down the hall. Other, much less common types of sets include triangular sets (three couples on the sides of a triangle), square sets (four couples on the sides of a square) or square sets with extra couples in the center; there are also "round-the-room" dances for couples facing couples, groups of three dancers facing each other, and so on.

Scottish country dances are made up of figures of varying length, to suit the phrasing of the dance tunes.  There are various kinds of figures ranging from the very simple, such as a couple changing places across the set giving right hands, to fairly intricate evolutions involving three or four couples at the same time. These figures are combined to form a sequence, which is then repeated several times to form the complete dance.  Scottish Country Dancing is usually energetic and enthusiastic. 

For more information, check out the very good article on Wikipedia

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