david munnelly band

Nic Gareiss has studied a broad variety of percussive movement forms, focusing primarily on the dance traditions associated with North American fiddle music. In his teens, Gareiss received dual scholarships from the Wheatland Music Organization and the Augusta Heritage Center to apprentice with the internationally recognized company, Footworks Percussive Dance Ensemble. Through high school, Gareiss performed with Footworks, including an ensemble role in "The Crossing," their production with Grammy-winning songwriter Tim O'Brien. At age sixteen, he took second place at the 2003 Cliftop Flat-footing contest. Gareiss currently works with the David Munnelly band from Mayo in Ireland. With the David Munnelly Band, Nic integrates the dance traditions of Ireland with American tap, exploring reaction of Irish immigrants to the infectious spirit of jazz they encountered in the 1920s as they settled in the United States. Nic has danced at the Milwaukee Irish Festival, Virginia's Wolf Trap Farm Park, the Ann Arbor Ark, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. and most recently at the Celtic Connections Festival in Glasgow, Scotland. A student of music and anthropology at Central Michigan University, Nic teaches American clogging and tap dance locally through the Wheatland Music Organization and Vision Studio of Performing Arts in Mount Pleasant, Michigan.