A hall full of dancers

You’ve only to look at this year’s photo of dancers ‘wearing the green’ below, and compare it with the 2022 photo to see the difference. The 2023 turnout of 46 dancers is almost twice the attendance at last year’s St Patrick’s Day Celebration.

We’re not back to the level of attendance at Johnsonville Club’s 2019 St Patrick’s Day celebration, but it’s enormously satisfying to have a full hall of dancers once again.

It is also another encouraging sign of a return to pre-covid participation levels – together with increased numbers at beginners’ classes (31 this year, vs 14 last year), and new members (10 so far this year vs 5 last year).

It was a grand night, full of the hilarity and high spirits associated with those tricky Irish dances. Every year, tutor Rod Downey finds new ‘easy’ dances for us to do, and every year they bring us challenges to overcome. Well done to our new dancers for taking those challenges in their stride so early in the year.

As has become traditional, we danced the two dances Rod devised for previous St Patrick’s Day celebrations – The Coleraine Rant and The Parting Glass, and welcomed club musician Aileen Logie back to play for us in 2023.

Rod tweaks the programme each year, introducing a new dance or two. This year St Patrick’s Jig and St Patrick’s Strathspey replaced the usual St Patrick’s Day; The Wild Geese and A Trip to Ireland returned; and we finished as always with The Irish Rover – not a dance for the faint-hearted. The Leprechaun will have to wait for another day, as we ran out of time.

There were so many green supper-time goodies this year, we were spoilt for choice. There was something for everyone, no matter their preference or dietary restrictions.

Elizabeth Ngan supplied green figs, green apple sherbet fizz, Lindt chocolate in green wrappers, green crackers with cheese, green grapes, and St Paddy’s Irish sandwiches with corned beef and lots of green lettuce. Janet T added to the sweet treats with green gummies.

In what we can hope will be a new tradition, club bard Aline Homes, made her first St Patrick’s Day appearance. She told us her version of the battle between folklore giants the Irish Finn McCool (Fionn mac Cumhaill) and Scottish Benandonner, and how The Giant’s Causeway came to be. Aline only had time for the first half of the story, we can look forward to the rest at our next St Patrick’s Day celebration.

Click on the gallery below to see Loralee’s photos of our newer dancers with the more experienced enjoying The Coleraine Rant (with an allemande substituted for the poussette) devised by club tutor Rod Downey.

Kristin Downey
23 March 2023

All photos: Loralee Hyde