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Latest News
British Nationals 2008 - many congratulations to Sam Goldsmith on winning the U8 Boys Championship!! Congratulations also to Frances Dunne for coming 3rd, Orlagh Naughton 9th, Terri Stutt 9th, Siobhan Amos 12th, Kim Lawrence 13th and to all our dancers who were placed and gained recalls. Photo Gallery 1 has now been updated with the presentations and trophy winners from the Summer Class Feis. Ireland NW Championships - for all those competing in this Feis in September, a timetable is now available - click on the link on the Upcoming Events page. You can fly into Derry City Airport with Ryanair from either Bristol or East Midlands airports. Congratulations to Siobhan Amos for winning her first Championship at the Jackson Feis in Leeds! Congratulations to all of our grade dancers and championship dancers who came away with an amazing 27 firsts at the recent Glendarragh Feis in Derby! Class Feis Adjudicator - we are very pleased to announce that our Class Feis adjudicator will be Anthony Costello from Limerick, Ireland. Riverdance is back touring the UK in 2009 - for the final time. The official site (www.riverdance.com) is calling it 'the farewell tour'. The show will be appearing at 14 different cities across the UK, so check the official site for venues & dates if you want to watch the show in the UK for the last time. Dates For Your Diaries - please see the Upcoming Events page for Feis dates planned so far for this year. We will add details of the venues and schedules as soon as they become available, but for now, please make a note of the dates. The Academy Show 2008 - we are pleased to announce that the show is confirmed for Saturday 13th September at the Custard Factory Theatre in Birmingham. We are planning to have special guests taking part in this years show and more details will follow soon. Tickets go on sale Monday 12th May. Parents and dancers - please note that the Birmingham Championship Classes are being re-structured to ensure smaller class sizes and more personalised attention. The re-structuring will commence from Friday 11th April. Congratulations to the Teams and Soloists who represented The Academy at the World Championships in Belfast! You made us all very proud! No-one could ever have imagined that in our first year, we would have such a brilliant result, Well done! Off To Belfast! We would just like to wish all our Solo and Team dancers competing at the World Championships in Belfast the best of luck! Enjoy the experience and do yourselves, your families and The Academy proud, good luck!! Lord Of The Dance is back touring in the UK...................in 2009! The show will be performing at various venues around the UK including the Birmingham NIA (see official site www.lordofthedance.com) for dates. Tickets are already on sale for the Birmingham shows which are being held 28th - 31st May 2009 (tickets for the Birmingham shows can be booked online at www.necarena.co.uk). The Academy is appointing a child protection officer to support our child protection policy. The Academy wants to ensure that all of its pupils are enjoying their dancing in a safe and protected environment. The Academy also supports the work of Childline and the NSPCC. Guidelines and the aims of our child protection policy to follow. Thank you. In the meantime, background information is available at - www.nspcc.org.uk Wow! What a great Class Feis! The latest Academy Class Feis was a great success! The venue proved to be the perfect location for holding the Feis and we had dancers of all ages and abilities taking part, some of whom were getting their very first taste of competitive dancing. Supported by an enthusiastic audience, it created a terrific atmosphere for our dancers to compete in. We would like to thank our adjudicator Margaret Morgan from Manchester and to extend our grateful appreciation to all the people who helped in the setting up and running of the Feis. Thanks again and roll on the next one! (photographs can be seen in Gallery 1) Well done to Natalie Lawrence for winning her first Preliminary Championship at the O'Morda Feis in Manchester! FANTASTIC NEWS!!! The Academy have been requested to give a display of Irish Dancing to entertain the crowd at the forthcoming England U20's v Ireland U20's rugby match at the Kingsholm Stadium in Gloucester on Friday March 14th!! We are very grateful to the organisers for this amazing opportunity to showcase our talented dancers in front of an estimated audience of 18,000 people! Venue details are on the Upcoming Events page. When you are out shopping over the next few months and you happen to hear the distant sound of a jig and dancing feet, have a closer look - it could be pupils from The Academy giving a display! We will be appearing at various shopping centres in the Birmingham area soon and we'll try and give you details of venues and times in the coming weeks if you want to pop along and help support us. Well done to all of The Academy dancers at the 2007 Qualifying in Telford! We are all so very proud of you! We had a total of 5 dancers on the box in the top five, 4 qualifiers for the World Championships and our first ever Ceili team was placed in the top five!!! Here are our individual results.....
The Academy Autumn Class Feis proved to be a great success! We had a high number of pupils taking part, many of whom came from our junior ranks and were getting their first taste of competing in a Feis. We were very privileged to have Danny Doherty as our adjudicator. Danny is a highly respected figure in the world of Irish Dancing, with 40 years experience. Staging events such as these would not be possible if it wasn't for the incredible support we get from the parents. We would therefore like to extend our grateful thanks and appreciation to those who gave up so much of their time - to those involved in organising and setting up the hall, for the banners, to our wonderful caterers, our 'secret santa' for the childrens presents, the programme sellers, to everyone who assisted with the running of the Feis and to the parents for supporting the event. Thank you!! Wolverhampton Feis Success For Our Juniors! We had a number of pupils representing The Academy at this years Wolverhampton Feis, with some of our youngest dancers competing for the very first time -
Our overall total was an amazing SEVENTEEN 1st place wins and EIGHT 2nd places! The Academy finished the Feis in great style with Frances also gaining FIRST place in the U17's Championship! Well done to everyone who took part - a great achievement! Pupils from The Academy enjoyed more competition success at The Great Britain Championships in Brighton. Congratulations to Frances for placing 5th and to Shannon for getting a medal recall (and we hope she remembers her set dance routine next time)! Well done girls! Feis success in Galway !! We are very pleased to report that Sam (aged 7) in his very first Feis, picked up two 1st place wins and Frances won 1st place in the Championship! A great achievement and well done! GREAT NEWS !! We have now raised the FULL total amount for the new Black & White Ceili costumes, which have been made by Gavin Doherty. Well done to everyone for their effort, support and hard work, with special thanks to Alice, Penny and Ciara for lending a hand. Pupils from The Academy competed at the All Scotland Championships in Kilmarnock (6th/7th Oct). The standard of competition was extremely high this year but our girls still did us proud. Frances placed a very creditable 6th - and considering she was in a group of two combined age sets, she did extremely well. Shannon also danced very well to win a recall medal in her age class. The Academy Irish Dance Show at the Custard Factory Theatre on Sept 30th was a great success!! The Academy pupils put on a fantastic display of traditional and contemporary Irish Dance to a packed theatre audience, with pupils of all ages and abilities taking part from the regional Academy venues. Byron and Ed would very much like to extend their appreciation and grateful thanks to everyone who attended the show, particularly to those who worked hard behind the scenes with the refreshments, raffle and for producing the wonderful costumes. But special mention must go to all the pupils who worked so hard to enable this show to take place. Well done everyone!! A final total of approx £1,100 was raised, all of which will be fed back into The Academy. MORE success for The Academy in competition!! The Academy pupils again achieved great results at the Feile Tuamhuan Limerick Feis over the weekend 22nd/23rd Sept. Many congratulations to Frances who came FIRST in her age class and congratulations to Shannon who came third. We hope you like the 'new look' website - we welcome your comments/feedback. A big THANKS to all of the dancers who helped to raise money for the new Harlequin flooring for the studio! 'The Academy' class uniforms are now available to order - please contact Byron or Ed.
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