Fairwell to Feisianna

Renee takes 3rd place at the 2012 Mid-Atlantic Region Oireachtas in Philadelphia

Canandaigua, NY. I’ve selected this picture for the blog in the past. It’s a favorite because it represents one moment when we were all so completely happy with the Irish dance experience. Previous Thanksgiving sojourns to Philadelphia had been pretty disappointing. When you don’t get what you want, experience is what you get. However, when you do get what you want, what you are, is HAPPY, and that’s what I see when I look at this picture.

As our run in competitive Irish dance has now come to an end, I figure, let us look back upon it with our fondest memories up most in mind. The 2012 Mid-Atlantic Oireachtas and Renee’s come-from-nowhere podium finish kind of started it all for the feisfunder blog, and so I think it’s fitting that it end feisfunder’s somewhat late-to-the-game run. A nod to Renee as she is endlessly inspired by her own accomplishments, and hers was the inspiration that kept us all going through four North American Nationals and three World Championships, all the way to a humble, but inspiring retirement from competition at the Bob Gabor Feis in Syracuse, NY.

It’s a little difficult to characterize our entire Irish dance experience in a few hundred words, when I finally have Renee’s entire competitive career to look back on, although it was just a scant 12 years. In that time a dream came to life before my very eyes. Not my dream mind you, but Renee’s. Her vision, focus and dedication have produced a future for her and our little family that eclipses any personal prize I could ever imagine short of Herbie Hancock asking me to join his band.

From the experience I got I can tell you that what you need as you hustle from feis to feis is fuel. You need fuel, and inspiration is that fuel. I know not from whence it comes, but I see it in the determination of the young people pursuing the glory that comes from perfecting a primal cultural expression – dance. And when it’s true to form and performed majestically with pride, any culture’s dance is its identity and forms the nervous system of a people who, while unrelated are still related.

True cultural expression is welcome around the world because people are naturally interested in and want friendship with their kinsman and neighbors in the world. Music, dance and art in their classic representations accomplish this for all of humanity. I mean, why would you want harm to come to a people whose civilization can offer such inspiring imagination, beauty and energy? What’s the use of fear and separation?

At the World Championships, the champions just get out on that stage and throw down. They already know there’ll be a hundred dancers behind them that want the prize, and they already know that there’s someone out there who maybe worked the harder and wants it more, and in the end – it’s all up to a panel of judges. Thankfully, having a life of its own, sheer pageantry carries the day. Every dancer wants to look their best, and each wants to do their best, oh, and have the performance of a life time, this time (no pressure).

I knew we were in for a long day when Renee returned to us from the stage after her first round, and while receiving compliments for her performance announces that she has just “bored John Carey”. The 8 time World Champion, trainer of World Champions and now judge at her Worlds competition was apparently not exactly rapt with her hornpipe. So I guess it was about time for some drama to ensue, and I guess you’d better impress him with your reel then.

Cherisse and I really had no expectations as Renee had precious little preparation for this competition compared to her normal un-injured run from Oireachtas in November until Worlds just before Easter. However, with only 7 to 8 weeks available to train flat out after the knee injury, her competition had been out-preparing her with every passing day for over three months. We didn’t really know what she’d have in the tank on competition day. No matter, Renee was here to dance like the champion who’d earned her right, and she would not accept anything but her best and now she’d bored John Carey.

Her second round, the reel in soft shoes was magnificent as it usually is, and a style trademark she’s known for in the ranks, but in the last few measures, breathtakingly close astride the dancer on stage with her she was unable to perform her final spin. Though she landed her final step with customary aplomb, she had blown it. That’s what she said. “I blew it.” As often happens dancers will tangle on the stage in the course of their dances and the results can be disappointing because your flow is broken, steps are missed. Fortunately for Renee, it was right at the end of the dance and in a situation in which judges could conceivably give you a pass on a flub in which you weren’t necessarily at fault, which she wasn’t.

Nonetheless, with a boring hornpipe and a flubbed reel, the girls set their minds on a hasty exit. I set my mind on a painful wait for the recall numbers. Roughly two hours passed and finally the recall list was in hand and the numbers were called out to the waiting dancers and their supporters. My heart was pounding as usual as I waited for the numerical result in which two thirds of the field was summarily eliminated — thank you, better luck next time.

The hush in the ballroom was punctuated by occasional outbursts as dancers received their recalls. The wait for Renee’s #181, being 81 numbers down the list was excruciating. Handfuls of dancers eliminated with each number called, and then “181”! Oh my God, she’s recalled, incredible, incredible! I rushed from the ballroom to find them. Round three would begin in just minutes.

Perhaps our fondest memory of this Worlds is Renee performing her set dance to “Vanishing Lake”, a contemporary set dance composition being played stage side on piano by its composer, Francis Ward, who had also been accompanying the dancers since 9 o’clock that morning. He played and Renee danced, and together I thought they were magic.

That Renee recalled and retained her World ranking is so much more than we could have hoped, Cherisse and I, but I learned something about these champions and that is, when you’ve worked hard enough to be at the top, you want to get to the top and so for some there was chagrin behind a gracious smile at the awards ceremony. This may have been their last chance, as it was for Renee, who accepted her medal with just a little disappointment as did many others on the awards stage with her.

Although competitions were over for her, Renee decided to attend her regular Sunday dance class and she found out that A. she can still dance those steps, though not without raising a few blisters; B. her feet and legs felt so much lighter without the weight of the dread of having to compete the new steps. So much lighter did they feel that she was actually enjoying the new dances for a change. And that, ladies and gentlemen, concludes the story of how one little girl got happy feet.

Thanks to those who have faithfully followed and read the feisfunder blog. It’s been fun to write and reflect on a truly unique opportunity to engage with the fascinating and vibrant world of Irish Dance. As I’ve said, I never would have dreamt it, nor the future in Irish dancing that lies ahead for a young aspiring performer with her whole career now ahead of her. Perhaps there will be a subsequent reporting of the exploits of a young up and coming Irish dancer looking to conquer the world on the professional stage.

Keeping you posted, as always, and many thanks for your support.

Jim

HELLO WORLDS!

 

Live action photo, first round, World Championships, London, 2014

Canandaigua, NY. After many years I realize I’m ‘inspiration dependent’. I need something to inspire me every day to get up and go. Having all the normal adult responsibilities just isn’t enough to move me and I’ve behaved irresponsibly towards myself and others in the past as a result. However, I’ve seen marked improvement since Irish Dance popped into my purview.

Irish Dance is very inspiring, but more to my point, it’s that one girl who dreamed and worked and danced her way into the competitive Irish dancing stratosphere. It’s her grit and determination, not to mention talent, that has me riveted to the cause. She is my inspiration, and forever will be.

I do hope she has all she needs to keep herself inspired. Lord knows it’s a lot of work in the freezing cold with the traipsing back and forth over miles of snowy highway to classes and lessons, and rehabilitating an injury besides, to be as ready as she can be to compete in the World Championships in Montreal in just a few weeks.

We have the picture above framed and hanging in our living room, a shining moment in time that crowns all our efforts as a family to date, not to mention Renee’s showing which propelled her to a world ranking. It never fails to bring back the rush of electricity and excitement that swirls ‘round in such rarefied air as you’ll find at the top of competitive Irish Dance, a place I could never have glimpsed or imagined even five years ago. I’m inspired each time I look at it.

Recently, I was piqued by some fatherly career advice given to actress, Tea Leoni, who recalled it in an interview, and I’m paraphrasing, “Don’t just do something because you’re good at it. Do the thing you’re passionate about and you’ll GET good.” I was thinking when I read it that here’s a thought that fairly sums up Renee’s Irish Dance journey,she being someone who always wants to do it all, was forced to realize that at some point, you have to choose, and she chose, essentially between gymnastics and dance, and it was a hard choice for her. That was some 5 or 6 years ago, but at long last, it seems pretty clear that she chose wisely, and she’s had the benefit of both regimens, with great teaching and coaching throughout.

It’s a great burden off a parent’s shoulders to know that a child of theirs can compete and excel in this world, and on that note, another quote, paraphrased as well, but very telling about all that Renee and the thousands of truly excellent Irish dancers who will come together at the World Championships know all too well. It was the much acclaimed, two-time World Champion, choreographer extraordinaire, Donna Griffin, who was assuring the Young School dancers 6 months ago that it wouldn’t be “baby steps” they’d be getting as the new dances they would learn for the next year’s competitions, and that if they expected to win, place or show they were “going to have to WORK”.

That’s pretty much the champions’ secret in a nutshell: do the work, get the guidance and do the work, every day, every day. And if you do it, then you must love it, so you’ll do it, every day, every day.

Look out Worlds and a Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all!

Keeping you posted.

 

Jim

Irish Dance. Still Number One.

Renee 5 dresses ago. Graphics by Matt Kominiarek. Dress by Colleen O’Neil.

Canandaigua, NY. It’s truly amazing to look back on the lifetime of a child now grown, and to have witnessed an unbroken chain of events guided by one central theme. I’ve eluded in past posts to what I guess you could call the “Riverdance effect”, as very early on, we came to the rather startling realization: this kid really wants to dance. Renee had memorized and performed “Riverdance” and its dramatic Flatley follow-up, “Lord of the Dance”, almost daily for years before ever setting foot in an Irish Dance studio. Jean Butler was her star.

So began our Irish saga and 18 years of a life fueled by dreams, passion, determination, adversity and elation. I sense the chapter nearing an end and it makes me think of the song that goes, “What are you doing the rest of your life?” You have to be pretty old to remember that tune, and it continues, “The North and South, the East and West of your life?” We’ve been a lot of places and made a lot of memories, but what exactly is next?

Apparently we’ve come to some turning points. Renee certainly has, and at 18 we’re glad she has a number of directions in which she can turn and retrain that laser focus of hers.

I could say that these past 18 years have literally flown by, but they have not. They have been long and hard seeing this child all the way to the World Championship stage. There has been a lot I wish had worked out differently, but that’s hindsight, and really, it all unfolded just the way it was meant to. I hope for Renee, that her last experience in competitive Irish Dance is as rewarding as her first experience. When and where that may occur I can’t predict. I do know that now it’s on to Montreal for one more World Championships.

World Championships, where everything has to click, and it has to click to the beat!

Now is the time we will see just how Renee’s love of Irish Dance has matured and how it will move her toward this goal. It’s a restart, for sure. Time away, is exactly that and you really feel it when you once again engage the strain of perfecting the intricate footwork, the precise jumps and turns. Fortunately, all the while she’s been healing her knee injury she has been able to rely on her employ as a coach at the gymnastics center, the YMCA and her dance students to keep her moving and at the very least, on the edge of the conditioning she will need on Dance Day, April 2^nd. It fast approaches.

After a podium finish in Philadelphia, then failing to recall in Boston in 2012, but achieving her ranking in London in 2013, a top 10 at Nationals, I guess you could say that at this juncture, Renee is poised to come from out of nowhere – perhaps her best position. However, a lot depends on the quality and persistence in her training. How much can be accomplished in a very short time?

Well, let’s see.

Keeping you posted.

 

Jim

 

MINDING THE GAP

 

Promotional picture from Renee’s CV photo shoot. Photo by Matt Kominiarek.

Canandaigua, NY. And so, here we are. What lies beyond the green door?

Just a few steps outside the great gate that girds Renee’s childhood paradise at Sonnenberg Gardens stands one of Canandaigua’s most popular photo settings. It was 10 years ago this weekend, Labor Day, in the USA, that the Burns’ moved into the Gatehouse there, and ten years ago that Renee began her formal Irish dance training at the Young School of Irish Dance. Last week was spent with choreographer extraordinaire and two-time World Champion, Donna Griffin, and this completed the last leg of the very exciting, mega-dancing 2014 summer tour, leading to a new beginning for us all now — in the “gap year”.

Borrowing a line from London Underground, we’re busy minding the gap between high school graduation and…what? Aside from discovering that taking a gap year after high school is fairly common, allowing a young person to contemplate their direction forward, whether through further education, skills training, employment or otherwise, we’re trusting that we have built a solid foundation for all future aspirations and potentials.

Renee has aspired to dance on stage in the big Irish dance shows since the age of 1. Her determination has carried us this far. She’s about as conditioned as she could possibly be, and you’re only 18 once – but for a whole year. So, as much as it unsettles the very conservative, get-your-ducks-in-a-row, earn-your-degree(s)-and-make-a-contribution-to-this-world matriarch of our family, losing this particular moment could result in a lifetime of regret. College degrees can be acquired over time and will endure, but youth is fleeting. Cherisse and I both agreed, we couldn’t let Renee go through life wondering “what if?”

After her last few years’ hard work as an Open Champion competitor, and the sacrifices we’ve all made getting ready and getting to all the major competitions: Philadelphia, Nashville, Chicago, Boston, Anaheim, London, Glasgow, Montreal, and countless local miles in between – we’ve been locked on to these coordinates. So, here we are. How will we accomplish her next objective?

It’s a fairly straight forward proposition really. She has a CV (curriculum vitae), some excellent references, a demo reel and the desire. So, if you’re reading this and you want an awesome Irish dancer for your dance show, variety review, video production, television program, podcast, film project or other, Renee has the goods. Please contact us. I’m not sure it will be easy for us, but we’ll let her go.

In the interim, there’s one more Oireachtas in Philadelphia at Thanksgiving to prepare for and one more World Championships next Spring in Montreal. Renee will continue taking classes at the Young School, working with her private students, and she’ll be putting in some time training budding gymnasts at Eagle Gymnastics, her second home here in Canandaigua for 13 years, as well. Filling her days will be the least of her challenges. What will the big challenges be?

I know how a childhood dream can hang on. I knew I wanted to play music from a very early age, and I could never let it go, and I can never get enough. I can relate to the thrill her Studio2Stage experience produced because it touched that chord she heard so clearly 17 years ago. She had her first real taste. It was brilliant.

It fired the imagination seeing the first fruits of all her hard work come to life in a bangin’ dance show like the S2S crew put on last month. Being truly her mother’s daughter, her attention to detail got her appointed a dance captain during the week long rehearsals, and this added to her excitement and satisfaction with the production and most importantly, a vision for her future. Now, it’s time to get down to business of letting the world know what’s up.

So, here she is, poised before the big green door.

Keeping you posted.

Jim

MY DANCE CAPTAIN

 

Canandaigua, NY. By all accounts, the Studio2Stage experience came to a thrilling conclusion on Sunday night at the Wilkins Theater on the Kean University campus, Union, New Jersey.

“Brilliant!” As the Irish love to claim. I concur, as once again Irish dance showed itself to be one of the most engaging and entertaining dance forms, and one that continues to gather more and more acclaim worldwide. For an aspiring performer that certainly is a great advantage and among the 60 participating dancers in the week-long Irish dance intensive there will definitely be professional opportunities in the offing. For Renee, life will never be quite the same.

Most Irish dance shows like “Riverdance”, “Lord of the Dance”, “Heartbeat of Home”, “Irish Celtic”, “Gaelforce” and many others originated and base themselves in Ireland. Studio2Stage was no exception, a true Irish production, with the producers and organizers, choreographers and musicians mostly hailing from the Emerald Isle.

An experience such as this had never been available here in the states until last year when the call for auditions went out to amateur competitive dancers all around the world, and from around the world they came. Australia and New Zealand were represented, so were Manitoba, Alberta and Calgary, Canada, and far away states like California, Colorado and Arizona, Minnesota and Missouri.

The great mix of dancers included some of the best competitive Irish dancers in the world. This naturally made “That’s Dancing” a very high caliber production, from the original musical compositions by Anthony Davis, to the choreography and the costumes – all first rate. Learning the ropes from great dancers and choreographers, all veterans of the big touring shows, was priceless and prepared the dancers to forge the divide between amateur and professional dancer.

Seeing the show come together through the hectic rehearsal schedule was a learning experience like no other save for joining an actual touring show. Some 60 hours of dancing were logged in rehearsals and the actual performance and Renee reports that her legs are still feeling it. As she described it, long hours learning steps and routines notwithstanding, “Each day it felt like I was building a gorgeous layer cake of happiness, and the performance was the icing on the cake.”

It goes to show that if you really love something you’ll love every minute of it. Apparently, love equals leadership as Renee was appointed to be Dance Captain of her crew. The Dance Captain is a prime member of any Irish dance troupe with a whole raft of responsibilities ranging from the health and well-being of the show’s performers to stage conditions in the many various environments in which they perform. Having inherited her mother’s acute sense of order, Dance Captain plays to one of Renee’s great strengths and naturally we were very gratified to learn of and about her highly visible appointment. This will look good on her CV we’re thinking.

As we collect ourselves following the long anticipated events of last week and prepare to head back out on the competition tour, we’re reminded of how Renee has been nurturing her dream since she was barely two years old. Very deliberately she has built her career to this point one competition at a time, one medal, one trophy, one sash, one more hour sweating it out in the studio. Dedication – very inspiring! Hard work – bring it on says the Dance Captain.

Feis at the Falls is next – Niagara Falls that is. Keeping you posted.

 

Jim