On the eve of the Dancing with the Stars final, former winners, Karen Byrne and Jake Carter, talk to Donal O’Donoghue about marriage proposals, the attraction of opposites and their musical talents.
“Ah, no, it wouldn’t be my cup of tea at all,” says Karen Byrne, laughing. The Dancing with the Stars judge is talking about her fiancé, singer-songwriter, Jake Carter’s music.
I suspect she’s joking – the laugh that follows is a clue – as the professional dancer reveals her own musical credentials, or lack thereof. “I could play the tin whistle in school, but that was about it,” says Karen. “And no, I can’t sing. My party piece is ‘Ave Maria’, which is a bit of a joke now with Jake. So, I’m not naturally gifted when it comes to the vocals. But I feel that if I were to pick up a tin whistle it might all come back.”
Her other half, a musician since his early teens, is aghast at the notion. “No, Karen, no!” “But I played it in school for years, Jake. I know ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’”. “No!” insists Jake. “You’re not buying a tin whistle.”
RTÉ Guide
We talk via Zoom, sound but no vision as the camera on Jake’s phone is bust. But we don’t need pictures to get the measure of this double act: Karen a straight shooter, Jake relentlessly upbeat. They tell me that their dog Lenny is also present.
“He’s sitting right here beside us, listening to everything, waiting to be asked a question,” says Karen. Lenny was also present on March 10, 2025, when Jake proposed to Karen on the set of DWTS.
“When I decided that I was going to pop the question, it seemed the obvious choice, a full circle moment to when we first met on the show in 2018,” says Jake of the year he and Karen won the Glitterball trophy. “I knew soon after we met, we’d be together forever,” adds Karen. ” It was never a case that I needed to have a ring on my finger, but it was still such a wonderful moment.”
It’s been a hard few weeks for Karen, whose grandmother, Kathleen, died just before the 100th episode of DWTS. “We were as close as you could be,” she says of her nan. “She was a wonderful person, but I know that she would have wanted me to do the show and just keep going.”
She describes herself as a bit of a toughie, someone who rarely cries but who did shed a tear when dancing with Paralympian Jason Smyth in 2024 (when they won) and then when Jake proposed to her on the set of the show last year.
“Ah that was more out of shock than anything,” she jokes. Any date for the wedding? “No,” they chime in unison. “But we were only saying last night that we need to start planning something,” says Jake. And the first dance? “I’m taking the night off,” quips Karen. “Jake can do the dancing by himself. He’ll be fine.”
RTÉ Guide
This is Karen Byrne’s second season as a judge on DWTS. “I’ve found my feet this year,” says the two-time winner of the Glitterball. “I’ve learned just to sit back and enjoy it, whereas my first season as a judge was nerve-wracking. I know how tough it is to be out there, all the training and rehearsing and then delivering on the night, so I really like to be encouraging and offer what is hopefully useful advice.”
As someone who knows the show from both sides of a scorecard, what does it take to win? “As we know, it’s not necessarily the best dancer that wins,” she says. “It’s about being relatable to people. The audience liked to feel that they are part of the dancers’ journey, and in that way, they get on board. And if you’re a nice person, people want to vote for you, don’t they?”
Karen has been with the RTÉ reality show since 2017. “It’s mad to think that it’s nine seasons of DWTS,” she says of her first joining the show as a dancer (one season didn’t happen because of the pandemic).
“My highlights? It’s hard to list one.” Jake cuts in. “It was meeting me, of course,” he says. Haha. The couple first met on the show in 2018, went on to win the Glitterball and then started dating. “I suppose an early highlight would be Des Cahill on season one. Yes, he wasn’t the best dancer, but Des’s background in broadcasting helped me when I didn’t have a clue about the business. Of course, also meeting Jake and then getting to dance with Jason [Smyth, Paralympian], especially in the final when I was blindfolded. But the ‘Dessie Swim’ will live in my memory forever.”
Karen is from the West Dublin suburb of Ballyfermot. “My mam put me in all different kinds of classes growing up, along with my sisters,” she says. “I never stuck with anything until I read a notice in my school about ballroom classes, and I said to Mam, ‘I want to try that!’ ‘Here we go again’ was probably what Mam was thinking at the time. That first class was a Saturday morning at the Civic Centre in Ballyfermot and as soon as I heard the music, it just unleashed something in me. I also enjoyed it because it was something none of my friends were doing, so I felt like a cool dude doing ballroom dancing! After that first class, I was hooked and wanted to buy the shoes, but my Mam was like: ‘You’re doing a few more classes before I’m buying you the shoes!’ Pretty soon, I was doing four classes a week, then I was flying to Liverpool to a dance partner over there and here I am now, on the telly.”
RTÉ Guide
Across the pond, Jake was growing up in the Liverpool suburb of Childwall, the younger brother of country music star, Nathan. “Both Karen’s Dad and my Dad work as builders, and our parents instilled a work ethic in us, and that nothing is handed to you on a plate. My Mam and Dad haven’t a note between them, but both of my granddads would have played and sang a bit. Nathan is eight years older than me and from the beginning, I remember him always playing music and that influenced me. I was gigging while I was still at school, from the age of 16, in pubs and clubs and nursing homes – anyone who’d pay me a few bob. And it just went on from there. I moved to Ireland in 2017, got a few gigs, did some stage work and then was partnered with Karen on DWTS in 2018.”
They say they are opposites in many ways. “Jake’s a real get-up-and-go person, whereas I’m a little bit of a . . . what’s the word Jake?” “Procrastinator,” says Jake. “Because Jake will try anything, it pushes me out of my comfort zone,” says Karen.
“Even on High Road, Low Road, it took me a while to say yes because I was thinking it’s not my thing.” Didn’t she also say yes to acting in Fair City in 2020 (Karen had a cameo part as a dance teacher on the soap).
“That was all down to Jake telling me that I had to say yes. I love Fair City, grew up watching it, but I was wary of doing it and so glad I did. So, this year is my year to try new things.” As to who’s the more romantic, there’s no debate. “Probably me,” says Jake. “Jake brings out the softer side in me,” says Karen. “I’m as tough as nails.”
And yet, maybe Karen’s not as hard as she says. Her older sister Linda, who was born with cerebral palsy and has been a wheelchair user all her life, has instilled an empathy for others in her younger sister. “One hundred per cent,” she says. “Our Mam and Dad treated us all the same, and Lin was never any different. Now with my sister, I see that some people don’t know how to act around her, worried that they might say the wrong thing, but we are all human and we can all learn and grow by having such people in our lives. That’s why having Jason as a dancer on the show was so brilliant. We had the craic together. As I learned that growing up with Lin, she just wanted to have a laugh and a bit of craic. And the other thing is that we all take our life for granted, moaning about something stupid, whereas the likes of Jason and Lin have it so much tougher.”
Karen and Jake run a stage, music and dance school in Dublin. “We started the stage school just after Covid and it was kind of a natural thing for us to do,” says Jake. “We have kids in the school who started on day one and are still there four years later, growing up with us. It’s lovely to see them progress in the arts with singing, dancing and acting.”
Would they like to have their own kids one day? “One hundred per cent,” says Jake. “Absolutely,” says Karen but adds that a few other boxes need to be ticked first, like buying their first home together, which will be in the greater Dublin area. “I could never get Karen out of Dublin,” says Jake.
But more immediately, there are the thrills and spills of the DWTS grand final. “It’s the first year I couldn’t tell you who might win,” says Karen. “But if you make it to the final, you’re truly earned it: your feet are in bits, your body is sore and you’re emotionally drained. From December onwards, DWTS is those dancers’ life, as it has been a big part of mine for nearly the past decade.”