Profile | Irish dance teacher Catriona Newcombe on Riverdance, founding Echoes of Erin dance schools in Asia, and getting culture shock back in Ireland

First steps I was born in 1973 in Ballycastle in Northern Ireland, the middle child of six kids. My dad was a monumental sculptor and mum worked with him – she’s a published poet. I started dancing when I was two and a half. I went with my sisters and was always the little one at the front, watching everything.

“When I was nine, I entered the Ballyclare Folk Dancing Festival. I had worked so hard, I think I was in my prime. It was my first major championship, it was amazing. I knew everyone at the competition, which went on very late and we got home at midnight. I used to practise morning, noon and night when I was little. When I was 11, I went to a Catholic boarding school run by nuns and had limited time to dance.

Behind the curtain I knew I wasn’t academic, I knew I wanted to dance. After I left school in 1986 I did a degree in dance at Derby University in the UK; it incorporated dance, healing and learning, dance therapy, music therapy and drama therapy. I did my dissertation on the comparison between contemporary and traditional dance. In 1995, I shadowed Riverdance in Dublin for two weeks. My mum always said, “If you want something you go get it.” So I wanted that, and I got it.

“I try to instil that in my own kids. If you want something badly enough you try your best to make it happen and mum did that. Riverdance was new that year and I got to go backstage and see exactly what it took to be a professional dancer. I spoke to people, sat and watched how they directed and choreographed it. It was absolutely amazing.

“I prefer choreographing to performing – I’m actually quite shy. I didn’t want to be that person out front, everyone looking at me. For me, to sit and watch my own choreography makes me happy – and that’s what I ended up doing.