Customer Reviews

Irish Set Dancing Made Easy Volume 1 DVD The Claddagh Set,The Sliabh Luachra Set,The Clare Orange and Green

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Context is everything, so let me say: I have very little experience at ceili dancing. I've been to one dance. So I've done the Sweets of May and one other dance that I've forgotten already.

Those dances made me want to learn more about Irish dancing (the traditional style, I mean; not the Michael Flatley Riverdance style). Next I tried to learn more about this dancing, using the web -- watching lots of online videos of ceilis etc. Online dance videos taught me a little, but not much, so I thought I'd buy this DVD to continue learning.

So far I've watched half of this DVD and skimmed the rest. My impression is that there is a lot of valuable info in this DVD, but, it really isn't geared towards beginners like me. It's more like a review for intermediate dancers, or a refresher for dancers who haven't done these dances in a long time.

They walk through some of the trickier steps at a moderate pace, then they demonstrate the entire dance figure at full speed. The video quality is good, very clear, and the audio is good. If you want to see how these set dances are done, at full speed, you get that with this DVD.

For me, it would have been nice to have more of the steps slowed way down, to help me learn. They do that a little bit, for some of the moves, but they don't do it often enough for my tastes. Watching this video makes me feel like a beginner who accidentally signed up for the intermediate class, and it's hard for me to follow what's going on.

Still, I gave it 4 stars. I think that I will be able to learn from this DVD, if I watch the steps over and over again, and if I slow-mo through the tricky parts repeatedly. I can get it eventually, probably. But I do think that the title, "...Made Easy" is a little misleading.

I wouldn't say that this video makes it easy to learn these dances. But, if they had taken the time to slow every step way down, then they wouldn't have been able to fit as many sets onto one DVD I suppose.

I began taking Irish Dance lessons and wanted to further my skills so I set out to learn more jig steps, etc. and thought I should purchase this DVD. I was a bit disappointed in this video. It does show the basics of Irish Dancing however the filming is low quality and the dancers are a little less than enthusiastic about what they are doing. Maybe traditional Irish Dancers are this way, but it was a bit boring for me to watch and get "inspired".