Stage: The dancing queen of the Kilkenny Arts Fest

Liz Roche joins her company on the stage of Bastard Amber

Maggie Armstrong

Of all the scary female figures that have made it into fairytale and folklore (dragons, witches, vixens, harridans, evil step mothers, bluestockings), it's amazing that the ballet teacher has got off so lightly. Any little rich girl (rarely boy) who was sent to ballet classes will have etched into their memory the cold and merciless approach of these disciplinarians, and some of us (rich and poor) still shudder at the word "choreographer".

But Liz Roche, a former ballerina and renowned Irish choreographer, does not come near the stereotype. She is softly spoken and wide-eyed, with a shy nature, but she still beat formidable contemporaries like David Bolger, John Scott and Emma Martin when she became the first ever Irish choreographer to have a full-length dance piece commissioned for The Abbey. The show, Bastard Amber, a gold-lit spectacular with live music and a flying set, was attended by the president and first lady when it premiered in May at the Dublin Dance Festival, and it now repairs to the Kilkenny Arts Festival for two nights.