\u201cYou\u2019d go on your bike in your dress, and come home on your bike.\u201d<\/p>\n
Town Hall Studio in Galway<\/a> is hosting an event held by Luail<\/a>, Ireland\u2019s National Dance Company. It has eight full-time dancers, and to mark its recent show Dancehall it has been holding a number of ancillary \u201cdancehall memory-gathering\u201d events around the country. On this night, some 40 members of the public have come from around the west and northwest to share their memories. <\/p>\n Edwina Guckian, Luail\u2019s dance deputy, is leading the conversations. She begins with a spirited Irish dance routine of her own, which has feet tapping. \u201cHow would the evening at the dancehall begin?\u201d she asks. \u201cHow much was it to get in?\u201d<\/p>\n [\u00a0Dancehall review: Luail\u2019s dancers let loose as the music pulses through themOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n \u201cTwo and six, depending on the band,\u201d one woman says. <\/p>\n \u201cSixty pence,\u201d says Geraldine Burns, from Limerick, of her local dancehall. \u201cMy parents both worked there on the opening night. There was a mineral bar, and afterwards my mother got the job of making the sandwiches. Bovril would be sold too on the night. Can you just imagine the smell of it? There would be ham and cheese sandwiches, and probably about 20 sliced pans would be used. There wouldn\u2019t be much butter on the bread, because my mother used to say [the men\u2019s] throttles will be well-oiled before they arrive, so no point in wasting the butter.\u201d<\/p>\n Burns has memories her mother passed on to her. \u201cThere was a mineral bar, and the man would be asking the woman what she would like to drink. She\u2019d usually order a packet of 20 Major cigarettes instead of a mineral. Limerick women were notorious for that.\u201d<\/p>\n Geraldine Burns indicates to the man sitting beside her, and says, \u201cWe met at that dancehall, myself and William. He asked me to dance, and we\u2019re married 42 years now.\u201d There is a round of applause from the group, while William Burns makes a show of pulling his jacket over his head, while laughing.<\/p>\n Once you paid the entrance fee, you left your coat at the cloakroom, in exchange for a cloakroom ticket, the vendor keeping its twin ticket. <\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019d put your ticket in your shoe to keep it safe,\u201d one woman says from the audience, and there is a murmur of recognition. \u201cThen you\u2019d go looking for it at the end of the evening, to get your coat back, and it\u2019d be in bits from the dancing and the sweating.\u201d<\/p>\n [\u00a0Ballrooms of romance: \u2018I wasn\u2019t the greatest dancer but when we danced together it was like it was meant to be\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n By the 1980s some dance venues were required to serve food in order to qualify for a licence to remain open longer into the night. The food was usually included in the price of the ticket. Sandwiches were off the menu by then, and chicken curry was on, and chicken in other variations. <\/p>\n \u201cI remember eating a lot of chicken in a basket,\u201d says one woman. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t eat it now.\u201d<\/p>\n Frank Murray from Carrigallen, Co Leitrim, has a story from 1958, when a new dancehall opened there. Before opening it was blessed by Bishop Quinn of Kilgore. \u201cUp to 700 were present,\u201d Murray says. \u201cBishop Quinn remarked in his speech that the hall measured 75ft by 25ft and cost over \u00a35,000 to build.\u201d<\/p>\n The band playing for the opening night was Norman Metcalfe and his orchestra, with an entrance fee of five shillings. A curate was on site all night to \u201csupervise the dancing\u201d \u2013 a phrase that would not be out of place in a William Trevor<\/a> story. <\/p>\n As for the much-repeated observation that women were usually on one side of the dancehall and men on the other, Murray explains why that tradition arose.<\/p>\n \u201cThe sides chosen were determined by the toilets, always ladies in rows across the doors for the ladies\u2019 toilets.\u201d There was not much nicety, according to Murray, in the way ladies in this dancehall were approached for a dance. A man would just catch a woman by the hand, \u201cand if he missed, he caught her somewhere else\u201d.<\/p>\n The 1960s to the 1980s was the era of dancehalls and showbands. The audience chants out names of the bands they recall. The Mighty Avons. Dickie Rock. Joe Dolan. Brendan Boyer. Larry Cunningham. Eileen Reid. Philomena Begley. One former showband member was in the audience. \u201cWe were a band called The Millionaires,\u201d Jimmy Higgins says, who played the trumpet. There were six others in his band, and they regularly played to 600 people at a time as they toured around the country. <\/p>\n Dances started relatively late in those days. \u201cThey wouldn\u2019t start until about 9.30pm, 10pm,\u201d says Veronica McKeon. \u201cThey\u2019d finish about 2am. Unless it was ladies\u2019 choice, which was one set of the night, a woman never asked a man to dance. After you danced with someone, you\u2019d go back to where the other women were. For ladies\u2019 choice, all the men came over to the ladies\u2019 side, and you\u2019d ask someone you\u2019d have spotted already.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Dancing](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/WO75ZPP5YNAOCN34LD4EGFHHEA.jpg\")
Dancing at the Metropole in Dublin in 1968. Photograph: Kevin McMahon <\/p>\n![\"Frank](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NS6FVUEEFRGCVNM4KPN3VJYUDY.JPG\")
Frank Murray from Leitrim. Photograph: Joe O’Shaughnessy <\/p>\n![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/KXRODARQYFFMXM4547N2K3BEHQ.jpg\")
Joe Dolan at the Breamor Rooms, Churchtown, Dublin, circa January 1986. Photograph: Independent News And Media\/Getty ![\"Philomena](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/XSILAVS4PFAXJAQ5LLDSVMHUUI.jpg\")
Philomena Begley on stage. Photograph: Andrew Putler\/Redferns <\/p>\n![\"Veronica](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/FTGEALLT3BECZNM6EXSJ34DBUA.JPG\")
Veronica McKeon from Drumreilly, Co Leitrim. Photograph: Joe O’Shaughnessy <\/p>\n
![\"Bridie](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/VLK73F5N4JCFJMS3XP5XGEZOQU.JPG\")
Bridie Mulligan of Drumreilly, Co Leitrim. Photograph: Joe O’Shaughnessy <\/p>\n