Kick Start Appalachian Dancers are becoming very popular at both festivals and public functions and the side features over a dozen skilful and enthusiastic dancers. One of their trademarks is the accurate rhythm they maintain in their dances, adding a precise percussive beat to the music. Their repertoire includes a number of challenging, original dances and a couple of speciality rhythmic numbers using broom handles and body-slapping (or Hamboning, as it's sometimes called in the USA).

Kick Start have a fine fiddler, Dave McInnes, who is an expert in the traditional fiddling techniques of the Old Time Appalachian fiddlers and provides a rich and rhythmic accompaniment. He is joined by fiddler and banjo player Dave Streeting, who has been known to dance as well, and bass player Glynn Murray.

Appalachian Step Dancing originates from the South Eastern United States and was probably developed by the early settlers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The dance style is a mixture of steps and movements, due to the many nationalities who contributed to its present form. There are aspects of Irish Step Dancing and English Clog Dancing in the dancing style and it may have also drawn on the many hard shoe dance traditions from France, The Netherlands and Scandinavia. The rhythmic music that accompanies the dancing is traditionally provided by fiddles, banjos and guitars and is itself an amalgam of many influences and styles.

They will also be leading a workshop on the flatfooting style

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