Gold medal glory as Elevate Academy wins world titles in dance
By Ciara O'Hara
It was a proud moment for Elevate Academy and its students when they were crowned world champions in several categories at the World Lyrical Dance Federation Championship in Dublin in August. Ruth Langtry won two world champion titles in the over 18 categories of jazz and lyrical, Haley Mulvany won two world champion titles in under 18 lyrical and over 16 acro, while two more groups were awarded gold in the over 16 advanced acro and the under 12 lyrical dance world championships.
Competing in lyrical, jazz and acro (acrobatic) dance styles, Elevate Academy were up against schools from South Africa, Scotland and England as well as Ireland and Northern Ireland. Despite working extremely hard ahead of the competitions, their gold medal glory came as a surprise. They attended the championships hoping to qualify, and never imagining they might win.
Aimee MacManus, who established and runs Elevate Dance Academy, told the Westmeath Examiner: “We competed years ago when the girls were very young, and then acro came into the school so the school took a different turn. So we left that competition and we started doing other competitions in Ireland, but we decided we’d like to try a few more competitions with world titles and such.
"So we decided that we’d qualify quickly in July just to see where we would place, just to put ourselves out there. And then we went to the event and the two girls qualified for the top six. So, you have to qualify to be in the event and then you have to qualify to be in the top six for the actual world title, in each style as well… Then they were top six then they won titles left right and centre.”
The winning acro team was a mixture of ages 10 to 18. “Skyfall was the title and it was an acrobatic dance piece that we worked on all year. And I just said, let’s, one last time, we might as well put it out there. And it won, and it beat the English team, so we were very excited over that. It was great,” said Aimee. Then the junior lyrical team won gold while performing a new routine for the first time. “Again, I was just putting it out on stage for experience… there were two team members missing; they were on holidays. So it was never meant to be this perfect win. And then the girls came first.”
“We went to these comps back when I first started… I didn’t even place top 15. I got no awards in either solos. I was 10 when I did my first lyrical and 11 when I did my first jazz. And we haven’t been at that comp in seven or eight years and then we went back to win worlds,” said Ruth, who never expected to be leaving the four-day event as a world champion twice over. “Once we qualified even for the event we were delighted and then… to come in the top six to get to dance again on the Sunday was my main goal. So getting even through to that… I was ecstatic.”
Haley, who also won world titles for her solo performances, was shocked too. “When my name was called, I started crying. I couldn’t believe it. I was so shocked as well because there were so many in my category. Normally they place top six but, in my category, they did top seven because they were stuck on picking people, so I was delighted,” said Haley.
Ruth said: “They go from six, five, four, three, two… so it’s when they get to third and then second… then when it got to the first, we were all just in tears.” Even Aimee was emotional. “I think that’s the first time I really cried over someone winning. Normally I’m like, ‘Woo!’, just really excited and happy, and then you’re back in the studio. But I was so emotional because I was just happy for them to place. Everyone’s journey is so different on the team, so you’re always hoping that they’ll beat their personal best and not be comparing each other to each other.”
“Those six weeks were the most I ever pushed myself in my training, physically. Every single day getting into a studio and spending about five, six hours every day until my mam would drag me home for dinner. And there were days where you just wouldn’t want to be anywhere else only dancing in a studio rehearsing over and over and over. I would just go into the studio and just dance it, record, watch it, give yourself feedback, dance again, record it, over and over again. And it was just nice that it was all worth it. Like, you dream of winning, but for it actually to happen, it’s a bit surreal,” added Ruth.
Even while holidaying abroad, Ruth kept up her daily training and stretching routine. “I was in Greece, in a little town. Our apartment was at the very top of this huge hill. I had researched and found out there was two gyms, and I found one that was like a CrossFit gym so it was very open. So that’s what we need. We don’t use a lot of equipment; it’s more just body – we use our ankle weights and resistance bands.
“So I just needed space and air conditioning. That’s all I wanted. So every single morning I’d go down, run down the hill. And I got such weird looks because people wouldn’t be used to our sort of stretching and strengthening. It was open for two and a half hours every morning, so I’d spend the two and a half hours there, and then I’d just pop in to the bakery and get my family some croissants, and then I’d run all the way back.”
Haley often practises at home with her younger sister Corissa, who is also an Elevate Academy student and was part of the junior acro team who won gold. “Keeping my stamina up is a big challenge because you’re flipping constantly; you’re doing techniques like turns, leaps, jumps, lifts, three-person lifts,” said Haley.
Aimee stressed that as well as acro, lyrical is challenging “because it’s a mixture of ballet, classical and jazz. So you have to be technically very good to achieve any kind of title in it”. It’s also more difficult to win as you get older because “everyone has such good technique at that level”, added Ruth.
After the dancers placed in the top six, they were given feedback from the judges. “We were just trying to apply all the corrections before we danced again in the grand final because there was just points between first second and third,” said Ruth.
“What some people might find difficult is being able to apply those corrections, see what they’re talking about and amend it as soon as you can. You’ve only got two days to fix all that where it doesn’t throw you off,” explained Aimee. The judges had commented on Ruth’s facial expressions and Aimee praised her ability to correct that so quickly. “If you’re practising every day for a month with the same facial expression, it happens naturally all of a sudden; you don’t even have to put it on. So to change it in two days is not easy,” said Aimee.
“With lyrical, you have to be able to tell a story. You have to be able to pull your judges into your story through your performance and your expression so it’s quite a journey when they are choreographing their own piece because they have to be able to connect with it.”
Haley’s winning two solos were her own choreography. “For my lyrical I did a James Arthur piece called ‘Recovery’ and for my acro, I did a song called ‘Feel Like I’m Drowning’ by Two Feet. And I love those two songs,” she said. “My lyrical one, I struggle with anxiety and OCD, so I picked that music to kind of relate to it and tell a lovely story about how I’ve tried to cope with it over the last few years. For my Acro, I thought it was a lovely kind of haunting song where I could pick a character and bring it to life on stage.”
Haley finds dance therapeutic, especially when putting together her own routine. “I did things that I would do with my OCD; I would put it in the dance to show everybody this is how it affects me,” she said. Ruth started dancing with Elevate Academy when she was 10 and Haley joined when she was just seven. They are both from Mullingar and they both attended the same primary school, Gaelscoil an Mhuilinn. Haley is starting transition year in St Finian’s College and Ruth is about to do her Leaving Certificate in Loreto College. A career in dance is one of the options Ruth is considering for after she leaves school.
“I’ve been helping Amy out a bit the last few years seeing what it’s like to be in a studio, being a teacher. And it’s a lot more work than I think a lot of people realise. It’s not just teaching a dance class. It is definitely something I’m looking into,” said Ruth, who takes PE as an exam subject at school. She says people don’t realise just how athletic dancing is and how you have to be “10 times fitter” than you need to be to play a sport. “You have to be so strong to get off the floor and perform all the time.”
Based in Mullingar, Elevate Academy has classes throughout the midlands, in Mullingar, Kinnegad, Tullamore and Athlone, teaching jazz, ballet, commercial hip-hop, musical theatre and acrobatic dance to ages three to 19. Aimee said that when the “acro craze took over”, she had to go to the UK to train. “You couldn’t do it here in Ireland. And it just took over the school then. It came out of nowhere and it’s so popular now. I’d say most of our classes are acro now. People sign up thinking they’re going to do this in two terms. They don’t realise how much strengthening and conditioning you’ve to do to just do one particular trick.”
As they practise, perform and compete together so often, the students of Elevate have developed a solid bond. “The mammies of the junior team all look at the seniors and they’re just in awe of the support and the love that they have for each other and the younger kids coming up the ranks,” remarked Aimee, who is preparing students for more competitions after a short summer break.
“It’s something that I don’t really over-emphasise in the school but the girls that do compete, compete a good bit. We’ll have to put so much effort in now over the next few weeks. We have another grand final coming up in Dundalk in October and it’s just going to be so much hard work to get back to that level.”
Haley and Ruth are looking forward to Dundalk and to the Dance World Cup in Prague next year and returning to the World Lyrical Dance Federation Championship when it is held in Scotland in 2024, said Ruth They can’t wait to get back in the studio.
“Any second I’m not dancing, I feel guilty. I should not be sitting down right now; I should be dancing. And if I am sitting down, it’s watching my dances,” said Ruth “Even today I woke up… I had to do a 45-minute workout and a half-an-hour stretch… I just can’t rest… It gives me energy… Once I get up and do something… your day is much more productive… If there’s something you’re that passionate about, like the dancing, you just have to give your all to it.”