Colorado Voices
How one Irish Dance studio celebrates St. Patrick's Day
Clip | 3m 5sVideo has Closed Captions
Irish dance studio connects students and community with Irish culture on St. Patrick's Day
Louise Connolly started her own Irish dance studio in Colorado to share a piece of Irish culture with her community. On St. Patrick’s Day, her and her studio showcase the unique dance form at free performances around the Denver metro area.
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Colorado Voices is a local public television program presented by RMPBS
Colorado Voices
How one Irish Dance studio celebrates St. Patrick's Day
Clip | 3m 5sVideo has Closed Captions
Louise Connolly started her own Irish dance studio in Colorado to share a piece of Irish culture with her community. On St. Patrick’s Day, her and her studio showcase the unique dance form at free performances around the Denver metro area.
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipWhen it comes to St. Patrick's Day, everybody tends to feel like they're somewhat Irish or they have a little bit of Irish in them.
My name's Louise Connolly, and I'm the owner of Connolly Irish Dance here in Lakewood.
I started Irish dance when I was eight years old back in Ireland, in Dundalk, Ireland.
So I've been doing it for quite a long time.
Get on the line.
On the line, Anna.
On the line, girls.
I auditioned for Lord of the Dance, Michael Flatley's Lord of the Dance in 97.
I started touring in North America with that show.
I met my now husband, who is from Colorado.
So that's ultimately what led me to settle down here in Colorado.
When I left and moved to the States, I just thought I didn't want to let go of any of my Irish culture.
And, you know, it had been in my blood since I was eight years old when I started.
So I just wanted to continue to do Irish dance.
And to do that I figured I just needed to start my own dance studio and show, I don't know, America or the local kids where I was living.
Try and give them a little bit of the culture and the background of Ireland.
The biggest thing I think that sets Irish dance aside from most other dancing would be how we hold our upper bodies.
We have to be very rigid and we can't move our arms.
While our lower half of our body is working extremely hard, our upper body has to be super strong to not move at all when we're doing that.
So my mom put me in, like, kind of rec Irish dancing when I was probably six, and she put me in it just because we have a Scottish Irish heritage and she's always wanted to herself.
That's why I got into it.
But I keep coming back to it because the people are like amazing.
Like all the girls here are my best friends.
I love the people and that's probably why I keep coming back to it.
I love the sport and the people.
One of the biggest things is the camaraderie that they have.
The older girls learn to be role models for the younger kids.
And then as they grow up and leave to go to college, then younger kids grow up and then they then will become the role models for the younger kids who come in after them.
They make lifelong friendships.
Up to your front.
And one and two.
Were always very busy around St Patrick's Day weekend.
Saturday, Sunday, we tend to do a lot of assisted living homes.
We like to give back to the community that way.
And then obviously we do a lot of bars and restaurants to do some shows.
So our day is just jam packed and it's chaotic but it's very fun.
We always love doing it because it's really fun showing our skills off to everyone.
We really enjoy making people happy with our dance.
For me to be able to give the kids the ability to go out on St. Patrick's Day and show off their talents, whether or not they're Irish or to have any Irish heritage or not, they feel like they're part of it.
And the Irish culture for me is just so important that it's a lot of fun to be able to bring it to the kids of our area.
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Colorado Voices is a local public television program presented by RMPBS