The festival tradition of Irish dancing has played a significant part in Ulster's culture over the past century.
This historical account takes the reader on a journey from courtly ballrooms and cottage firesides across a landscape of barn dances, harvest homes, fancy dance classes, feiseanna and festivals, narrating how Catholic and Protestant children held hands in town halls, parochial halls and Protestant halls even when bombs splintered communities and deepened mistrust.
Highlighting the various provincial towns that nurtured and helped to grow the festival movement throughout the 20th century, the significant figures in the development of 'festival', the champion dancers, influential teachers and those unsung community 'heroes' who kept this iconic cross-community activity devoid of sectarianism through Ulster's darkest years.
With source and archive material drawn from contemporary reports dating back to the 1700s and including interview material with some of the current crop of festival dance teachers, this new work will be a significant draw for the thousands of current and former festival dancers both within Northern Ireland further afield.