Fabulous Beast’s artistic director Michael Keegan-Dolan has been friends with Hothouse Flowers lead man Liam Ó Maonlaí for many years. For Rian, they have brought both of their passions together to create a joyous evening of traditional Irish music with Keegan-Dolan’s contemporary choreography.
At the outset, eight dancers and five musicians sit amongst an array of musical instruments on brown wooden chairs, reminiscent of those you would find in an old village hall. They are dwarfed by an enormous emerald green wall behind them, and look eagerly into the empty green space, awaiting a performance. Ó Maonlaí picks up his Celtic harp and places it in the centre of the space, lights a candle, and sings a heartfelt and moving Irish song called Mo Ghile M’fhear.
This sets the tone for an evening that puts music at its heart. For the following 100 minutes Ó Maonlaí and his musicians elicit yelps and hundreds of toe taps from the Sadler’s Wells audience with their impassioned playing and infectious melodies. Weaving in and out are eight natural and generous dancers, offering a variety of physical responses to the music. ‘Rian’ means ‘trace’ in Irish, and Keegan-Dolan’s choreography revels in the idea of people replaying this music, learning each other’s dance steps and teaching new generations how to appreciate and ultimately fall in love with music. Repeatedly (a few too many times by the end), one dancer will begin a phrase and slowly the stage will be filled with bodies in unison. Importantly though, Keegan-Dolan’s unison celebrates the individual and allows for each dancer’s personal response to the movement to shine through.
The piece is a love song to tradition, music and dance exploring how our contemporary world can learn and engage with these rituals. Doey Lüthi’s costume design creates a perfect image of a modern setting, revelling in days gone by. All the women (including the stage manager) wear knee-length, patterned kitsch dresses in different shades of green with brown brogues. They would be perfectly on trend sitting in a café on Brick Lane, or at a céilidh.
It’s the moments that subtly merge old and new and that celebrate music and movement combined which really connect emotionally. At one point, 22 year-old Maitiú Ó Casaide sits centrestage with the entire company seated on either side of him. As he plays the pipes the dancers and musicians gently begin to sway to the music, slowly growing larger and larger in their movements. Their feet leave the floor and their limbs float in the air, their bodies transported through pain, joy, sorrow and wonder. Their giant shadows dancing on the green wall behind them become their parents and grandparents hopping wildly to the local piper in the village pub on a Friday night, transported by the raw power of the traditional music blaring from a small stage crammed with musicians eager to tell their story.