“Somedays it’s really tough and I feel like my feet are going to fall off but those are the days I love it the most,” confessed junior Lauren Kelley. Every Monday at 4:30 p.m. Kelley rushes around her kitchen looking for bread and cheese to throw a quick sandwich together, runs out to her car, and drives the 20 minutes it takes to a studio downtown Minneapolis where she has been dancing for the past five and a half years. However Kelley isn’t your average ballerina instead a very unique and culturally involved style of dance consumes her Monday nights.

Irish dancing is a tradition that began shortly before the 14th century after the Viking raids had ended. However now we don’t much about what this type of dance was like until the 1750’s when the Gaelic league was formed.

“My family is extremely Irish and when I was young we would always go to Irish parades on St. Patrick’s Day and do stuff like that. Then in fifth grade my uncle had a gig at the St. Paul festival, he played the drums in an Irish pipe band, and there were tons dancers that year and I thought they were really beautiful and they looked like they were having so much fun so I decided to try it and I’ve been doing it ever since,” answered Kelley.

Authentic Irish fairs are filled with food, music, dancing and a lot of culture.

“As the founder of St. Paul Irish Dancers, I am often backstage working on the next choreography.  But I will see a big mop of brown hair go leaping by (Lauren) or a quick smile as she rushes off stage to change into her next costume.  It is quite the transformation to see Lauren at practice with her signature earrings in, her hair pulled up in a ponytail and wearing her Stillwater athletic gear to, POOF – the transformation to an Irish Dancer who performs regionally in Minnesota,” said dance teacher Eileen Dahill.

Generally the dancer has to maintain a stiff upper body throughout the entire dance while also doing a variation of quick precise movements with their feet.

“It’s different and it’s fun that’s why I love it. A lot of times when I tell people that I’m an Irish dancer they hop around and laugh but it’s a lot more than just jumping up and down and shuffling your feet randomly we have hundreds of steps that we do and warm ups just like ballet has first second and third position we have what we call our 1’s, 2’s and 3’s. There are a few types of dances I do hard shoe and soft shoe. Hard shoe is rough, kind of like tap where we don’t just have to worry about what our body looks like but also the sounds our shoes are making on the wood. Then there is soft shoe which is more gentle and light and pretty. I’m probably better at soft shoe so I like it better,” chuckled Kelley.

Irish music has barely changed over the centuries. It sounds very similar today as it would have centuries ago. There are four different types of Irish dance and each has a unique style of music that goes along with it. Hornpipe, reel, jig and set dances are the four dance styles and each has smaller sub groups within them.

“My favorite type of Irish music to listen to is the music associated with the slip jig. When I first started dancing I hated the music I thought it was annoying but it’s grown on me..I’ll admit I listen to it when I’m working on homework and before I go to bed sometimes..it’s addicting,” said Kelley

The costumes the dancers wear range from the modern style which are bright sequin filled dresses with a variety of patterns to the more simple traditional style which are usually darker colors and have less intricate patterns. The shoes they wear are always black. The soft shoe, also known as ghillie, are open with laces strung across the top of the foot like a ballet shoe and the hard shoe closely resembles a tap shoe.

“Lauren has always been one of my best friends. She’s always come to my musical performances, and when she started Irish dancing I was thrilled to see her on the stage in her huge curly wig. The Irish Fair show I went to ended up being fantastic, and Lauren danced great!” exclaimed junior Sarah Matschi.”

Both her friends and her teacher would agree that she is very talented.

“Lauren dances on St. Paul Irish Dancers “Advanced Performance Team”. It is the highest level of dancing at St. Paul Irish Dancers. Although Lauren is in her 5th year of dancing for us, her team mostly consists of dancers that have been taking lessons and performing for around 10 years or more.  Her desire to Irish dance has followed with an awesome skill set.  Lauren dances soft shoe and a hard shoe that has a fiberglass toe and tip. Lauren seems a natural for our challenging choreography! Lauren has danced to music by Metallica, Drop Kick Murphy’s as well as traditional Celtic Music.Sometimes an Irish Dancer is labeled as a great soft shoe dance or a mighty hard shoe dancer. But Lauren is that wee pot-of-gold in that she excels at it all,” said Dahill