It’s no secret that the Valley is crawling with talent. One emerging superstar is Niamh McGrath. Recently, she competed at the Canadian National Dance Championships, a competition that tours the entire country, where she won first place for her category and first place for her entire age group, reached “high gold” standing, and received a special shout-out from the judges.
McGrath, who is currently in grade 7 at Chateauguay Valley Regional High School (CVR), has been dancing since she was seven years old. She trains with Sabrina Robidoux and studies jazz, ballet, and little bit of contemporary, though jazz is her main choice. She used to take group dance lessons, but she now focuses on solo performance. She says that her relationship with Robidoux is a very close one. McGrath’s favourite songs to dance to are upbeat Taylor Swift songs.
This was her first big competition. She explains that “At first, I was really nervous. When I got on stage, I wasn’t nervous anymore. I just forgot about everybody. I was just focused.” The focus paid off, as she was one of the biggest successes of the competition.
Her mother, Sayard Chartrand, says that she was over the moon with joy and pride seeing her daughter shine at this competition. McGrath tends to be shy, but she lets go of all of that when she is performing. Her next competition is coming up in May, in Ottawa; she says she’s going into it feeling less nervous and extra excited. In the future, she hopes to help Robidoux by teaching dance to some of the younger students.
