Creating Riverdance

March 1, 2017

“We begin with a lonely band of musicians  on a big empty stage…
From a point of darkness…enter row upon row of hard-shoe Irish dancers
and they pound their way downstage towards audience and camera…”

With these notes, producer Moya Doherty began the creation of Riverdance. The show would become a worldwide sensation and eventually change the way we see dance and theatre. Riverdance is a breathless, brilliant and life-affirming musical, bringing  dancers, singers and musicians together on one stage in a spectacular celebration of Irish music, song and dance.

Riverdance began as an intermission act in the Eurovision Song contest in 1994. Seen by nearly 300 million viewers, the seven-minute presentation of wild and passionate Irish step dancing was so popular that the creators decided to expand it into a larger show. The result was a full production at Dublin’s Point Theatre in 1995, which began Riverdance’s journey around the world. Propelled by Bill Whelan’s original music, Riverdance mixes traditional Irish culture with the music and dancing of other peoples and societies, so Irish dancers reel on the same stage with African American tap dancers, Russian folk ballet dancers, and a Spanish flamenco dancer.

From its birth at Dublin’s Point Theatre, to London’s West End, New York’s Radio City Music Hall then on to three international touring productions, Riverdance has thrilled and moved audiences all over the world. Riverdance breaks down the barriers between countries, languages and cultures. As director John McColgan says, “We wanted to open up the new vision of Irish dance, to have it share a stage with other world dancing. We dreamed that, by doing so, these dances would mingle and spark off each other so as to create a performance with its own identity. It would be a performance rooted in the folk memory and arts of the Irish people, yet fresh, unique and exciting, and accessible to people everywhere.”

Back to where it all began, Riverdance comes home to Dublin this summer
Experience the international phenomenon in its home town.