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| Chelsea Crow of McDonough, Georgia and Amanda Carpenter of Grayson, Georgia, recently shared their talent in Irish dance with thousands of WorldFest guests at Silver Dollar City near Branson, Missouri. For more information on the Drake School of Irish dance, click here. |
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| Editorial note: Irish dance is a rich and beautiful tradition. It is also extremely complicated, both in terms of history and present-day competition requirements. It is great to get such an indepth article here as many questions on the Irish dance culture are answered. |
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• MidwestIrish.com is a part of Lucky13Studios Design Family. For more information, see JoshuaHeston.com•
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• Celebration of Dance
by Jessamy Bleth • Starting Young, Going Far Amanda Carpenter & Chelsea Crow Championship dancer Paul Beardsley |
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During this interview, what was most striking about both Chelsea and Amanda was their great love and respect for the Irish dancing tradition. And that combined with their great talent makes them a joy to watch perform.
On Irish dancing in the States —
Amanda: It's actually in a lot of the states. And you really don't know.
Chelsea: You just have to know where to look. It's like an underground world. A different dimension!
Amanda: Our school has locations in Georgia, Florida, Texas, Tennessee, North Carolina,....So we're all over.
On competition —
Amanda: That's why I've been doing Irish dancing. This is my first show ever and so it's totally different because in competition we don't smile at all. And here we have to use our arms and smile.
Chelsea: Competition is very straightforward. The traditional, no-arms [dance style]. You don't have to smile, you can have a serious face and just go out there and kick butt and this is just to entertain people so it's very different.
Performance and choreography —
Chelsea: This is all performance. This is all entertainment. The steps we are doing are traditional steps from our school. They are steps we have been doing for a long time.
Amanda: We just kind of mix them together.
Chelsea: The sequencing is different. And we added showy bits like [using our] arms and smiling.
Amanda: And our hair, actually. It's straight. And usually it's curly.
Chelsea: We always wear wigs. Big, curly wigs.
Amanda: We have the huge curls. And we don't wear tights in competition, unless we are doing the teams. We usually wear socks up to our calves. So that's different.
In terms of the show, you have 300 people out there watching you just for the fun of it, and then coming up to take pictures, and wanting their picture taken with you . What's that like?
Amanda: It's really cool. And we've actually had people ask for autographs.
Chelsea: Yes, that's a new one. It's just strange because we've always been judged. I mean, that's the competition. That's the reason — everyone is judging you. Watching you. You don't mess up. But here you are just here to have fun. People come to watch you have fun — and have fun with you. So it's very different. It's a lighter atmosphere. So it's nice. I could get used to it.
Competition pressure —
Amanda: I don't get really nervous for competitions — when we do the world competitions over in Ireland, those are big. And then we have nationals every July/end of June. And then we have regionals in December. And those are our three major competitions. And we have little competitions at the side.
Chelsea: I think competing is a lot more stressful than performing. I've been on stage since I was two. I do tap, jazz, ballet. Irish is a big part of my life but my real passion is just performing. So I feel a lot more comfortable on the stage than I do competing.
Amanda: See, I'm the opposite. I quit ballet, the tap and jazz, just to do Irish. So this is it for me. This is my life pretty much. I quit when I was seven or eight. And I love it.
On Irish heritage —
Amanda: I might be like three percent Irish, but I'm 50 percent German.
Chelsea: Way back on my dad's side, but I'm a full-quarter Puerto Rican, and Ukraine, and some Cherokee Indian
Amanda: I have some Cherokee too
Chelsea: Not much Irish!
Amanda: I'm not doing this because I have ancestors. I'm doing it because I saw Riverdance and said, I have to do that!
Chelsea: Mine was Feet of Flames. And when I found out that Ashley (who has always taught me for other dance) was teaching Irish dance I was like "Lord of the Dance! I want to do that!"
Regardless of your ancestry, you are carrying on an incredibly rich historical tradition and artistic tradition and what's that feel like?
Amanda: It's great, but when people come up to you and ask you where you are from they get so disappointed! They get so disappointed when we say we're not Irish.
Chelsea: [And we say] We're from Georgia! Sorry.
Amanda: But it's great to be able to branch out in the world. Because there are people in Australia that do it — all over the world.
Chelsea: It's widespread. It's a really great culture. So beautiful and it's nice to be a part of it. It's fun — it's really a lot of fun.
On favorite dances —
Chelsea: Well, I like the softshoe, like the slip jig. That's a nice, slow, graceful type — I really like that kind, but there are also times that I just like to pound it out in the hard shoe, and just put the aggression in it! It's fun but it just kind of depends. Sometimes you like the lighter softshoe and sometime you like the heavier hard shoe. It can just go either way.
Amanda: I don't know. I like my soft shoe better, but people tell me that my hard shoe is better.
Chelsea: Your hard shoe is really good. And I like doing hard shoe better but people tell me my soft shoe is better.
Amanda: You're more of a graceful — I would think your soft shoe would be better. I like the reel of the soft shoe dances. But out of the hard shoe, I definitely like the hornpipe — which we don't do any of those here.
Competition steps —
Amanda: we have traditional sets that we have to do. Everybody does the same steps. But dance-wise, treble-jig-wise, each school has their own set of steps. So we have someone who choreographs our steps that we do. And then depending on your level you get different steps.
Chelsea: Of varying difficulty. The younger kids do the easy little steps and then it gets fancier. We get all the new stuff. Because the lady in Ireland that choreographs our steps brings over the latest trends in Ireland.
Amanda: Everything starts in Ireland. All the new moves and everything begins over there.
Chelsea: It takes us awhile to see what's coming out.
Amanda: Even dresses. We've gotten some tutus going under the dresses. All different kind of things.
Chelsea: Rhinestones.
Amanda: Sequins.
Chelsea: Different wig styles. Tiaras. It's a beauty pageant/dance competition.
Amanda: It's getting kind of crazy, but I love it.
Competition style versus performance style
Chelsea: If you can imagine, anything that's not arms tight, head straight — anything other than that has been jazzed up for the show.
Amanda: And for the slip jig, we do the arms that flow and arms on the hips. That's all the fancy stuff that we typically don't do.
Chelsea: [competition] is very straightforward.
Amanda: And it took me awhile to get the whole turning the head on the treble reel — that was so hard because I am so used to looking straight ahead. That was strange for us, but we got it.
For Amanda Carpenter and Chelsea Crow, the interview for MidWestIrish.com was their first. It's highly unlikely it will be their last.
May 14, 2006