A few years ago the weekend nearest St Patricks Day the Irish community would stage one of the biggest St Patrick’s Day celebrations in the world culminating with Irish dancing, singing and music with a big show at the Domain. Alas these no longer take place.
However last year, the Showring at the Entertainment Quarter featured a sea of green, white and orange with all manner of dress including leprechauns, other people covered in Guinness logos or wrapped in the Irish flag. Stalls selling handicraft and traditional foods did a roaring trade.
Clearly, there is a readymade audience for this show and in fact on opening night there were busloads of people eager to kiss the blarney stone of Irish culture. Gauging from the enthusiastic clapping and hollering they were not disappointed.
Unlike many shows performing Celtic music and dance, this show had a slight but charming narrative. The striking set is divided into two, the left half creating a pub called the Irish Celtic, the right half featuring a giant neon Irish flag.
We, the audience, are invited as guests into the Irish Celtic pub by its owner Paddy Flynn. In fact right at the beginning of the show he comes into the audience and welcomes individuals into the pub.
Through delightful song and dance, the Master of the House Paddy gives us a brief synopsis of Irish history and then goes on to recount the origins of the pub created by his grandmother Rosie O’Grady, who was a survivor of the Titanic. Paddy describes it as a ship built in Ireland, made of Irish materials but driven by an Englishman!
Paddy’s wry humour punctuates the performance and includes many Australian references which resonated with the Sydney audience. The great migration which took place in the 18th Century and the carefree dancing on the eve of the Titanic’s departure are powerfully portrayed with sympathy and delicacy in the migration sequence, and with percussive athleticism on the deck of the Titanic.
The show’s second half is more about courtship, marriage and death, with the pub hosting all these rites of passage.
There is quite a sensual dance where both genders seek to woo one another through dancing prowess. There is indeed prowess as the dancers jig and whirl and move their ankles to tap almost one hundred and eighty degrees as if they were dislocated from their legs. The boys dancing displayed a powerful macho strength in their percussive step dancing (tap dancing is an incorrect term in this context).
The girls were even more remarkable as they stepped/tapped on their toes which are traditionally covered in fibreglass rather than metal. A tale of unrequited love was sensitively portrayed by three soloists who throughout demonstrated eruptive percussion within this tale of passion.
The final scenes celebrate the pub’s ability to preserve Irish dancing and singing. As for singing the dancers were accompanied by a five piece band comprising fiddle, Irish bagpipes, piano, piano accordion and guitar. Despite its small size the band created an impressive wall of sound that filled the Capitol theatre. The guitarist was also the band’s very impressive vocalist.
When I say accompany the interaction between the dancers and the band is more ‘call and response’ which heightens the rhythmic skill of the dancers.
The greatest pleasure in this show is when all twelve dancers are on stage stepping with infectious enthusiasm and in striking unity.
As in any pub the pub’s owner calls time and we are requested to go home. Unlike in most pubs when one is asked to leave, this exaltation was greeted with thunderous applause in recognition of a hugely enjoyable show.
Ordinarily I would give this four stars but in this case I give the show a four leaf clover. If you find such a specimen you are always delighted and if you find your way to this show you will be doubly delighted.
Highly recommended, IRISH CELTIC plays Sydney’s Capitol Theatre between the 7th to the 12th August.