Review: Celtic Rising at The Burlington

If you’re fresh from watching Ireland’s newest Rose of Tralee being crowned on the telly last night then this just might be the traditional, Irish heritage-loving post for you.

Culch was lucky enough to be able to head along to Celtic Rising at the Burlington on Monday night for what turned out to be the best bitta craic (great gas, now we’re suckin’ diesel and whatever throwback phrase you’re having yourself) we’ve had on a schoolnight in quite a while.

The show is pitched as a celebration of Irish heritage and culture and their promo video on The YouTube is all about the [i]Aon, Dó, Trí[/i]…

…we were expecting Riverdance with a sitdown meal thrown in and, well, we weren’t entirely wrong…

Starting out the night by spending five minutes at a standstill at the entrance to the Burlington car park while a tour bus reversed up to the door to drop off a gaggle of grannies, we were a little bit apprehensive about what was in store for us but parked up and made our way inside to the ballroom all the same.

With the show running five nights a week (excluding Tuesdays and Wednesdays) the stage is a semi-permanent fixture in the ballroom complete with two large screens at either end which variously showed Fáilte Ireland videos, Mary Black quotes and old Irish proverbs throughout the evening. We were seated up the front, four of us on one side of a table for ten (the other six of whom we never did get talking to - blame the fact that none of us have kissed the Blarney stone I guess). The six were already tucking into soup when we sat down and within minutes the same starter arrived in front of us and main course orders were taken. Some of the party described the set menu as a “debs dinner” but having had quite a few dodgy debs dinners in my time I’d hazard it’s not quite that bad. There’s bacon, salmon and chicken on offer with a lasagne option for vegetarians (our Culch veggie wasn’t mad about it) but the real triumph of the menu is the number of Irish placenames it manages to squeeze into the descriptions of just six dishes (Lusk, Boyne Valley, Limerick, Wicklow, Lough Corrib, Cork, Kerry, Ballycotton and Muckross…if you’re wondering).

A soup, chicken main and fruit coulis dessert later, we found that the food service was prompt but getting hold of two bottles of wine took a bit longer. I’d be reluctant to complain about it - if anything, it seemed the staff weren’t too used to people ordering extras and when they did come they were delivered by a very friendly staff member.

The show kicked off with a video intro from Minister for Tourism Mary Hanafin on the same screens where we’d watched the Fáilte Ireland videos throughout dinner with various comments of “oh I was there” and “I keep meaning to go to that” and then we were straight into the opening number from lead vocalist Naoise Stuart Kelly.

Who was closely followed by Riverdance-esque dancing and then straight on into a trad session courtesy of the live band.

Most of the party thought the band was the highlight of the evening, playing traditional toe-tapping, hand clapping tunes. They raised a few whoops from the crowd as they belted through a selection of jigs and reels before the flautist took to the stage alone to play ‘The Lonesome Boatman.’

The galloping pace then continued on with male lead vocalist Eoin Cannon taking on ‘You Raise Me Up’ followed by Naoise’s ‘Molly Malone’ and ‘Danny Boy’. A song called ‘Isle of Hope, Isle of Dreams’ led into the break (the latter part of’ which I misheard as ‘I love tea’ - a fact that went on to formulate most of my toilet queue conversation). It was only during the break, while listening to the accents all around us, that we got a sense that the audience contained some older Irish people along with the expected tourist crowd. One complained loudly in the toilets that they’d left a verse out of Danny Boy, but that the girl had got the accent right. I was completely taken with the idea that the show has such a comely-maidens, postcard-Irish feel to it that the lady forgot she wasn’t watching an American take on Irish culture but one that’s entirely homegrown.

The second half saw renditions of U2′s ‘With Or Without You’, Celine Dion’s ‘My Heart Will Go On’ as Gaeilge and ‘Galway Girl’ as well as ‘Celtic Pasión’ - about as close as an Irish dancer’s hips will ever get to Latin dancing. At points the story the performers were attempting to thread together between music and dance didn’t quite work. Naoise’s voice is impressive, but she’s not 15, as the lyrics of one song about landing on Ellis Island suggest. Nitpicking aside however, you can’t fault the entertainment value of the show.

There’s no doubt that Celtic Rising is even more for the tourists than its closest counterpart, Riverdance, but its pretty damn good for what it is. The show with dinner included is a €49, 3-hour show and I found myself doing sums in my head while we listened to the closing number because I couldn’t quite work out how the price covered dancers and musicians who are as good as you’ll find at any authentic ceílí or feis ceoil. The closing number, incidentally, is a song called ‘Home’. It’s an original composition, nicely put together but lacking that final sing-along quality of something everyone knows. That said, we did make up the hand-clapping portion of the room so perhaps I’m just foisting my idea of a good audience on people who were quite happy to watch quietly.

For all its Disneyland atmosphere, Celtic Rising is still very much worth a look if you’re into traditional music, not-so-traditional Irish dancing and fancy having a look at how we’re presented to the rest of the world. It’s also an enjoyable night out that only goes to show we’d probably all still enjoy a bit of a ceilí of an evening if the twee element wasn’t laid on quite so heavily for the visitors.

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