This year’s Embassy Festival was an online festival. Like previous years, the Kilkenny School of Irish Dance was asked to participate, and the performance was filmed by the filmmakers of the Embassy Festival in front of the Hofvijver and Binnenhof in The Hague. Please check out the performance on the Festival’s website.
We were also featured in the ‘Haagsche Courant’ newspaper!
What a year it has been! No competitions, no live performances, limited indoor classes… Nevertheless the Kilkenny Irish Dancers kept on dancing, at home, via Zoom, in the park or on the streets in the city center!
The KSID dancers came together while social distancing at home, for a virtual performance on King’s Day. Many thanks to Laura Lundy for the choreography and to Aiobhin Quinn for editing. Music credit: Yvonne Fahy – Isolation.
On the 9th of February 2020 dancers from the Kilkenny School of Irish Dance performed during the ‘Gluren bij de Buren’ Festival in The Hague. ‘Gluren bij de Buren’ translates to ‘Peeking in on the neighbours’. During this festival people open their houses and turn their living rooms into small stages, for an afternoon of performances (music, dance, theatre etc). Members of the public then walk around the town and select which performances they would like to see. We held three sessions of Irish Dancing, and had a full living room with over 30 guests for each session.
Photo credit: Frank Jansen
Come and try some Irish Dancing during ‘The Enchantment’ Festival in the autumn break! Irish Dancing became known in the Netherlands after the Riverdance show during the Eurovision Songfestival in 1994, but Irish Dancing itself goes back many centuries and can be done in many different forms and styles. Most important is the footwork, which is often amazingly fast. And at the same time you have to try and keep your upper body and arms straight! During this workshop you’ll be introduced to a number of styles with the so-called ‘soft shoe’ and ‘hard shoe (a kind of tap dance shoe), there will be demo’s and you’ll get a chance to learn a few basic dance steps yourself. Please check the programme at www.debetovering.nl and register for one of the Irish Dance workshops (on 23 or 24 October 2019) below.
From our smallest Beginners to our World Qualifiers, team Kilkenny brought the house down with their performance at the St. Patrick’s Day Festival on the Grote Markt in The Hague. It’s wonderful to see The Hague embracing the Irish culture, and it is a highlight for both dancers and teachers every year.
Thanks to the Irish Club Netherlands and the Grote Markt for organzing and hosting such a fantastic event. We are already looking forward to next year’s performance.
On Sunday the 3rd of February a diverse group of Kilkenny Dancers -ranging from our youngest beginners to some of our Open Championship dancers- demonstrated their Irish dancing skills to the visitors of the Feel At Home Fair in the City Hall of The Hague. They started with an a capella hard shoe routine, followed by jigs, reels and traditional set dances, giving the international audience a good insight into the different flavors and various techniques of Irish dance.
On a wet winter weekend in December, Amsterdam Schiphol came alive to the sound of taps and beats, as the best Irish dancers in Europe and Asia gathered to compete in the Mainland European and Asian Irish Dance Championships. We could not have asked for more to have this wonderful event on our own door-step. For the Kilkenny Dancers, this certainly proved to be a ‘Home Game’, as the results include two European Champions, two European Trophy Winners and seven World qualifiers!
Seven World Qualifiers:
European Trophy Competitions:
It was also a fantastic first-outing for the Kilkenny team-dancers, who won medal after medal for their 8-, 4-, and 2-hand reels.
All in all, it was a perfect end to the year for all the dancers and a reflection of all their hard work and determination.
The parade of champions can be seen here
On the 3rd of November our senior Kilkenny dancers performed at the benefit Lions Club function in Rijswijk, where they also met the Irish Ambassador to the Netherlands Kevin Kelly who also is a dab hand at pointing the toe.
Irish Dance workshops will be given as part of the Enchantment (De Betovering), the international children’s art festival taking place during the autumn break. Please check the programme at www.debetovering.nl and register for one of the Irish Dance workshops (on 24 or 25 October 2018) below
