Ballymena Livestock Mart jiving instructor advises 'it's a great night out without spending a lot of money'
Ballymena Livestock Market, the beating heart of farming in Co Antrim, is also the unlikely venue where around 80 people take jiving classes every week.
Instructor Matthew Sloan has been taking a jiving class in Ballymena - and many more throughout Northern Ireland – since 2014.
“I have been teaching jiving 12 or 13 years,” he said.
"Out of all my friends I was the only one who could jive, before it was fashionable.
"People were going to Kelly’s nightclub but I would rather have been going to a country dance than stand and listen to dance music.
“But then country music became fashionable which suited me well”.
The Kilrea man said his “life is immersed in agriculture through my day job of farming and machinery to county music and jiving”.
He said: “I did the jiving competitions for Balmoral Show for years and I have worked with TG4 and BBC where I met a lot of Irish country stars,” he said.
“I met Nathan Carter and Daniel O’Donnell and he was a real gentleman".
"We used to squeeze 200 people jiving into the Ballymena market but the numbers have gone down,” he said.
"That was when jiving was a really big thing. But it has cooled off in interest for people over the last few years.
"When Nathan Carter came onto the scene at the start it was absolutely massive".
Matthew said he believes that a problem around the Ballymena area is “there are not enough places for people to go dancing – Ballymena has nowhere to jive”.
He said his classes are made up of “all ages from young children of four and five- years to a couple who were turning 90”.
"We get a massive variety of people and it is a nice night out without spending a whole lot of money”.
"They can come along in their gym gear and enjoy themselves.
"It is also an easy place to go for people who are widowed or on their own and stuck in the house as they will definitely have fun as they learn.”
Matthew currently teaches classes in Eglinton, Limavady, Maghera, Ballymena and around the north coast.
They also have classes in Knocknagoney in south Belfast.
“When we were teaching jiving before Covid I would have had classes 4 times a week,” he said.
"I would also have done weddings and parties and a lot of ceili dances.
"But after Covid the demand slowed down – plus I have a young family now so I don’t have as much time as I had."
For more information https://www.facebook.com/jivenorthernireland