Stepping on it, Irish style
QUESTION What are the origins of Irish step dance, popularised in Riverdance? IrIsh step dance is characterised by a stiff upper body and quick and precise movements of the feet.
The form became internationally famous when Michael Flatley brought riverdance, an Irish step- dancing extravaganza, to the 1994 Eurovision song Contest. It went on to become a hugely successful theatrical production that changed the way Irish dance was performed and viewed.
Dance is thought to have been part of Irish culture since Celtic times.
The people held feiseanna — festivals where people came together in song, dance, music, storytelling and games.
When the Normans invaded Ireland in the 12th century, they brought with them their native dance, the Carol. This is the first dance style recorded in Ireland. It involved a group of dancers forming a circle around a central singer.
It wasn’t until the 18th century, when Irish dancing became more disciplined, that the style we know today evolved.
Itinerant dancing masters travelled between villages and towns giving lessons to the local communities. rivalries between dancing masters led to the formation of Irish dance competitions.
In 1893, the Gaelic League was founded in order to promote all aspects of Irish culture. It began organising formal competitions and laid down rules for Irish dancing.
This developed into the Irish Dancing Commission in 1930, which regulated the increasingly popular pastime.
There are three main styles: set dancing, social or ceili, and sean nos or step dancing. Each has the classic hallmarks of Irish dance: they are formal and regimented; utilise little upper body movement; and require a strict number of timed steps and rapid foot movements.
The rigid upper body aspect is thought to have developed in the 18th and 19th centuries, when dances took place in small rural pubs or crowded barns, because of limited performance space.
Carol Keefe, Cardiff.
QUESTION Frankie Laine sang about Sheriff Elroy P. Lobo — who was he?
Frankie LaINE was a popular american singer whose career lasted nearly 75 years. he was associated with the theme songs of many Western films and TV shows, such as 3.10 To Yuma and rawhide.
he was therefore an obvious choice to sing the theme song for The Misadventures Of sheriff Lobo, a sitcom that ran on the NBC network in america from 1979 to 1981. It was a spin-off of another series, B. J. and The Bear.
One of the shows’ characters, sheriff Elroy P. Lobo, played by Claude akins, was a corrupt sheriff. he was assisted by Deputy Perkins (Mills Watson), whose buffoonery made matters worse.
The first season, set in the fictitious rural Orly County of Georgia, was well received. But when the action moved to the big city of atlanta in the second season, ratings fell and the show was cancelled.
Ian Macdonald, Billericay, Essex.
QUESTION Does anyone remember a Left-wing newspaper from the Sixties called The Sunday Citizen?
The sunday Citizen began life as reynolds’s News, a radical weekly newspaper published from 1850 to 1967.
It was founded by George W. M. reynolds, a popular author and Chartist sympathiser, who advocated political rights for the working class.
reynolds had made his name as the coauthor of the long-running serial The Mysteries Of London — tales of vice, depravity and squalor in the slums contrasted with the luxury lifestyle and debaucheries of the upper class.
reynolds’s Weekly Newspaper was launched on august 18, 1850. In February 1851 it was renamed reynolds’s News and was sold under that name as a sunday paper until 1923. It became the leading radical newspaper of the era, and had a strong republican bent. It sold especially well in the industrial North and by 1870 had a circulation of 350,000.
Following reynolds’s death, his brother Edward succeeded him as editor. When he died in 1894, the Liberal MP James henry Dalziel became the proprietor.
Dalziel modernised t he paper, introducing a women’s page, serial stories, popular songs, and mechanical and medical features. In 1924, a change of name to reynolds’s Illustrated News reflected the growing importance of pictures.
The paper was acquired by the Co- operative Press on behalf of the Labour Party, becoming reynolds News and sunday Citizen. after World War II, a dramatic decline in sales saw it relaunched under various names.
In 1962, it was released as a tabloid, called the sunday Citizen, but sales continued to dwindle and the newspaper ceased production in 1967.
Malcolm Bright, Newcastle upon Tyne.
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