Category: Irish Set Dancing

Welcome Set Dancers, 

This is a companion course for our in-person class in Portland, Oregon. You can still follow along if you are in-person or learning online. I will offer tips and tricks for practicing at home by yourself.

You will discover creative ways to study set dancing even as a solo person. Many of you are at home on your own without a partner. It can be a challenge. But not as hard as you might think! I learned many of my set dancing and steps solo. In the process you can really hone your skills before having to work with a partner. I will also provide tips on how to practice without attending a ceili. Not to mention, some bonus tips and tricks for memorizing sets in isolation. 

Kevin Burke once told me a story of a show where the dancers were two short of a set, so one of the musicians joined the group with a chair and danced the set with a chair as his partner. It’s a great story and I can’t do it justice. So, I must invite him as a guest to tell us the story himself. In the meanwhile, don’t be afraid to develop a temporary relationship with a nice looking piece of furniture.  

Get your set dancing ready for the dance floor. 

WEEK 1 | Class notes

Saturday, September 17, 2022

THE CLARE PLAIN SET

Our first week we had 12 people ranging from 6 months old to 79 years old. Here’s to keeping set dancing going for years to come! Lovely to see you all out and dancing. We covered footwork for traveling, advancing, dancing at home and housing. You will find a few video references for these movements. We also danced the Clare Plain Set. This dance is from County Clare. The while you will see dancers battering the foundation is the smooth gliding step we covered in class. These steps will be the foundation for all of the Clare dances.

Warm up & Technique

Traveling: Smooth 3’s

Video coming soon

• Set Dancing Teacher Instructions
• Dance Minder Instructions

WEEK 2 | Class notes

Saturday, September 24, 2022

Our second week we will learn the Clare Lancers. We will also review and cover set dancing technique and form. Our second class was a blast. Michael and Margret visited from California. Michael played flute for some of the figures.

WEEK 3 | Class notes

Saturday, October 1, 2022

This week we will learn the Connemara set and Jim Loewenherz will play for our class. It’s such a blessing to have live music while learning. One of the great things is that we can dance at the pace that we are learning and right away be in sink with the music and each other. Starting out we will dance this set smooth and eventually when you are ready you can add the battering step to the set. You will find the instructions as well as the video reference for the set. Also on this page is the Connemara step broken down and a practice video.

• Set dance teacher: Connemara Instructions
• Dance Minder: Connemara Instructions

Here is the battering step for the Connemara Set. It is not necessary to have this step in the set, but if you want to work on it on your own I will have a session down the line where we include it in the set and we will work on traveling with the step. If you like the battering footwork keep working on this step on your own and focus on moving with the step. This will give you a leg up when we bring it into the whole set in later weeks.

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Some dancers find the stamp and stamp step easer to travel with when first starting out. You can cover a greater distance on each stamp and stamp.

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WEEK 4 | Class notes

Saturday, October 8, 2022

Merchant Set | Reel 128, Reel 192, Reel 128, Hornpipe 144

Videos for the Merchant Set can be found here.

Click and go to YouTube to see these videos.

WEEK 5 | Class notes

Saturday, October 15, 2022

Antrim Square | Reel 144, Jig 136, Slides 152

Youtube Playlist Link

WEEK 6 | Class notes

Saturday, October 22, 2022

Ballyvourney Jig Set | 4 Slides (32bar tunes) 4x each

WEEK 7 | CCE Quarterly Event

Saturday, October 29, 2022

Rambling House Ceili – a page of all the dances we will dance as well as a YouTube playlist and a Spotify playlist. I have tried to include most of the dances that we have covered in class in the ceili. There will be a few new ceili dances that you might not have learned yet and we are missing the Clare Plain Set at the ceili (we will be sure to dance it next time at the Butterball in November 😊).

1. Connemara Set | Reels 160, Reels 192, Reels 184, Maggie in the Woods 96
2. Haymakers Jig | Jigs 400
3. Merchant Set | Reel 128, Reel 192, Reel 128, Hornpipe 144
4. Siege of Ennis  | Jig
5. Clare Lancers | Reels 160, Reels 192, Reels 144, Reels 192, Reels 192
6. Ballyvourney Jig Set | 4 Slides (32bar tunes) 4x each
7. Fairy Reel | Reels
8. Antrim Square | Reel 144, Jig 136, Slides 152
9. Waltz

• Set Dancing Resource Page | An all in one resource page for set dancers. More resources added regularly.
• Spotify Music Playlist – please save this playlist in your Spotify account. When ever possible I will add the music for each set on this playlist. A great resource for practicing or teaching the dances to your friends and family.
• Youtube Set dance playlist – please save this playlist in your YouTube channel. I will work on adding each dance we learn to this playlist. Having them all in one place will make it easy for you to learn and remember the material we cover.
• Irish Set Dance Notes – I love the way this site describes the instructions and how the instructions are laid out. If a set is on this site I usually use it first as my reference.
• Dance Minder – my friend Michael Harrison runs this site. It is a great recourse for dancing notes and music references.