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The Beauty of Irish Dance

Irish dance requires grace, strength, and dedication in order to improve your skills. It may come with a bit of a price tag but it is worth it in the end. Irish dance is a beautiful sport that teaches discipline and gives you a chance to be the best that you can be. I encourage anyone to give it a try.

Practice is something that most dancers attend four to five times a week depending on how far into the levels of dance they are. As a beginner, you are practicing at least one time a week, for about one hour to two. In those few hours, the basics are taught over and over and over again until they are perfected. And when they are, your dancer will move up to be in the advanced beginner level. Here they will have a more advanced and technically trained teacher to instruct them. They will compete and be required to win either a 1st or 2nd place at a feis in order to move to the novice level. They will once again move on to harder and more technical dances where they too will be perfected with longer hours and more classes during the week. When you compete as a novice dancer at a competition you are obligated to place first in all four dances that are required by your regional competition rules. They do not have to be won all in one feis, but must be awarded before you can move up to the prize winner level of Irish dance. It is challenging because there are more difficult dances and the judges are critiquing every mistake. When you fulfill the four required dances and win a first place in all of them you will move to the Preliminary level. There is where you will be pushed to the limit and worked to your best potential where you will become a beautiful dancer and, will be moved to the open championship level when you win first place in two competitions.

There are many competitions that you can attend but in the Irish dance world they are called Feis’. Anyone can compete in these but normally it is either the people from you dance school or the schools in your area. There are regional competitions named after the region they are held in. These competitions are called Oireachtas. Here every school that wishes to attend this feis that is located in the named region is welcomed to dance. Then there are Nationals where one from any part of the nation can compete. Lastly, there are Worlds and here is where everyone from around the world come together and competes for the title of the World Champion. You must qualify for both Nationals and Worlds in order to compete in them.

With all of the class fees, accessories, and entrance fees the bills pile up and it can become **very** expensive. Depending on your school of dance the class fees can range from affordable to expensive with only the difference of a teacher but, compared to everything else it’s nothing. Girls are required to wear a dress, either their school dresses or their own solo dress. The school dress or skirt can range from $30- $300. The more elaborate solo dresses range from $600- $3,000 depending on the dyes, fabrics and, the amount of jewels and beads with detail on it. They must have certain socks called poodle socks and they are usually around $8-$15. Wigs and tiaras are not necessary but are very common in the Irish dance world. There are two types of wigs: bun wigs and full wigs. They are customized to match your natural hair color and curled then either left down and extremely curly and bouncy or put into a bun on the top of your head. These range from $50-$150 depending on the type and length of them. Tiaras are used to decorate the wig and draw attention but are not necessary and will not take points off but of course having one might add some on to your score. Shoes are mandatory in a competitive dance and there are special pairs for different dances. The soft and quick feet dances are essential for gillies, a soft fabric shoe that moves with your foot. The hard, powerful dances use hardshoes which make the deep sounds and help keep form in your feet while you dance. Both boys and girls use these shoes. Boys are required to wear black pants and a turtle neck but for competitions are able to accessorize with a colorful, detailed vest.

Although the practices are hard work and a lot of money, they are worth it. Not only does it teach you discipline, it gives you confidence and makes you work harder. The competition is a friendly competition because you are competing against friends and teammates but, it gives you the determination and strives to do better next time. The discipline is helpful in school I must say because when it comes to dance instructors, if you don’t listen the first time you’re never going to hear it again. The teacher work you until they think you can’t go any further and will push you to your best ability. You will become a great athlete with the base as Irish dance because it teaches the basics you will later on need in order to be the best you can possibly be. Irish dance teaches you to be graceful for any other kind of dance, it keeps you endurance level up because you are constantly moving and keeps you in great shape, and it will encourage you do strive and do better than you last because not only do you want to be the best that you can be, all dancers are shooting for that moment of glory and working hard to become the world Champion!

Moira Connelly