About

Dance Your Way formally began in 2017. Choreographer, lead dance teacher and founder, Miranda de Barra has been teaching in Ireland and the UK since 1999.

Miranda has taught various genres including ballet, jazz, street dance and modern but when she completed her Ballroom & Latin teaching qualifications she decided to establish a school with a difference. Dance Your Way not only provides formal IDTA syllabus training in Ballroom & Latin for exams and competitions but also offers separate Theatre Dance training. These classes combine all artistic and performing styles of dance and have a theatrical focus. It is unusual for a school to offer training across these two areas.

 

In the world of dance, Ballroom & Latin fall under “Dance Sport” with a mainly competitive focus and what we call “theatre genres” – ballet, jazz etc – are a separate world. These two worlds traditionally have not crossed very much, but due to the popularity of Strictly Come Dancing and the increasing number of theatrical shows based on partnered Ballroom & Latin dance, like Burn The Floor and others, they are starting to merge more.

Miranda comes from a theatrical background having worked as a professional actress as well as a West End agent and Casting Director. Her insight into the Performing Arts and how she sees it constantly evolving inspired her to create a dance school where dancers can explore their potential in an even more diverse way.

Another fundamental aspect to the opportunities at Dance Your Way is the constant exposure to guest experts. Dancers have been able to hone advanced technique from a high level international Latin champion dancer, they have studied inspiring theatrical dance lifts and pas de deux work from a West End performer. Dance Your Way provides regular opportunities that are rare outside of a professional third level environment.

Miranda is also breaking new ground for her students by choreographing theatrical duets that combine Ballroom & Latin with theatre genres. The resulting work achieves the artistically led and story driven pieces that we see performed by the couple dances on Strictly. This is a new area of work and a challenge which her students adore.