If you love dancing and you fancy taking up something a bit different this could be just what you’re looking for.

Unless you’ve seen them performing, it might surprise you to discover that there is a Bulgarian dance troupe on the island - but you don’t have to be Bulgarian to join.

The group, called ’Rhythm of Bulgaria’, was started in January 2015 by Rumyana Georgiev, a trainee accountant at SMP Partners in Douglas, with some of her friends.

We went along to watch the group at Move It dance studio in Westmoreland Road in Douglas, where they rehearse on Tuesday and Saturday.

Rumyana, who was born in Sofia, said: ’Everyone is welcome to join the group. The only condition is that you love dancing. We found a place to practise with five or six of us doing it at first and we started to get invitations to perform.

’We started off performing simple dances such as one called Horo but day by day the choreographies became more complicated and our dancers more experienced and we started doing more performances all over the island.

’We now have 15 dancers but it can be hard for all of us to practise or take part in concerts every time as we all have different jobs and kids to look after.’

Many Bulgarian dances are line dances, with the dancers holding hands in a straight or curved line, facing in toward the centre of the dance space.

Originally men and women danced in separate lines, or in a gender-segregated line, in which the last woman and first man held opposite ends of a handkerchief, to avoid gender contact, but today men and women often dance in mixed lines.

Several different handholds are used in the different dances.

Rhythm of Bulgaria have performed at Yn Cruinnaght, Tynwald Day, Peel Carnival and Peel Day.

Rumyana continued: ’Here on the island there are Bulgarians who are musicians and singers and sometimes they join us too.

’We are all originally from Bulgaria except for one of our girls, Aida Podobska, who is from the Czech Republic. Aida also does Manx dancing.

’Her husband Jiri comes to the performances and takes photos for us.’

See Rhythm of Bulgaria performing at CeltFest (formerly Yn Cruinnaght) in Peel on July 15, Douglas Carnival on July 16, and Peel Carnival on August 5.

For more information about the group or to contact them visit the Bulgarian Dancing IOM Facebook page.