Riverdance

On 30th April, it was 15 years since the world was set alight on the night of the Eurovision Song Contest.

For the first time, we did not have to sit through a rendition of the previous winner’s latest single or some medley of songs and places of interest from the host country.

I can remember thinking ‘What the hell is this?’ as the woman sang plaintively for the first few minutes. And then the vision of Jean Butler doing that most peculiar dance. Followed by the insistent drum beat and the dramatic incursion of Michael Flatley, leaping and spinning for all he was worth.

The final act with the massed ranks of the dancers legs tip tapping mesmerisingly in time to that drum beat still brings tears of emotion to my eyes all these years later.

I was very pregnant on that night and I can remember the baby kicking along to my tapping fingers and toes and I believe it may well have had an effect on his musical preferences as he grew older because I played it a lot over the next few months. The piece itself was hugely popular and went on to become a hugely successful stage show.

The Eurovision Song Contest no longer carries the same importance that it did then. In these days of bloc voting and the departure of Terry Wogan with his gentle wisecracks, things have become very different.

But the memory of Riverdance lives on.