Dayton Feis Review

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The Dayton Feis was held on June 23rd,  2012 at Sinclair Community College in Dayton.  Here is what this casual observer had to say…

Venue –  I liked it.  May have seemed a little crowded to some people but I thought it was OK.  The stages were paired into twos,  at least the one that we were on,  but that was to accommodate limited musicians.  Unlike Louisville last week though,  it appeared they planned for that and had similar dances and comp sizes running simultaneously. Good camping space and stage separation (except the paired ones of course). Food was one floor up and awards two floors up, but it was a nice break to walk around between dances.

Judges – rotated frequently. Two thumbs up. You should know by now how I feel about a judge staying on one stage for multiple dances (“no sir, I don’t like it” (Ren and Stimpy reference, if you got that, you are my hero 🙂 ))

Food – good job there too. They had burgers, pretzels and pizza,  but also provided healthier alternatives like veggies,  humus and chicken wraps.  There was also a Skyline Coney table if people were so inclined. Prices were reasonable.

Vendors – thumbs down, sorry. The shoe guy (George, actually his daughter this time), a wig table and an accessories table. No fun Irish SWAG, no books, no tshirts, in fact, I didn’t even see any Dayton Feis tshirts (might have missed it but if they had them, it was not evident).

OK, now for the big negative… results. It was somewhere between 90 minutes and 2 hours between my daughters dance and the results posting. I had flashbacks to the Akron Feis and LOTS of people were complaining about result timeliness. It was about that long for the second set of results to come out too. Later in the afternoon, it seemed like things got smoother, but people won’t remember that part, they will remember the slow postings.

So the WTF Rating – While I was at the feis, dealing with the results taking forever, I was thinking the rating should be 4.5, but as I read this, I really have more positives than negatives, so I will say 6.5. It could be higher, but waiting on results is big for us parents Dayton.

Louisville Feis Review

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What to say about the Louisville Feis, held 6/16/2012,  well how about….

Thumbs up for the judging as they rotated often.  Not doing that is one of my big pet peeves.

Results came out fairly quickly,  somewhere between 10 and 30 minutes after each dance but typically closer to 10. Good job there!

Food was typical but pretty good and not outrageously priced.

I am afraid that is where the positives have to stop though.

The new venue,  although I hear through the grapevine is just temporary, is terrible.  Small and very cramped with inadequate seating and camping space and very loud,  so loud in fact the musician stopped and tried to hush the crowd.  Sorry,  call them like I see them.

Music was an issue with musicians playing for two stages at the same time.  Fine if they are both on the same version of the dance,  but otherwise it slowed everything down, sometimes quite a bit with one stage not dancing at all. I do have to give BIG PROPS to the musician that played stages 2 and 3. She played continuously and I saw her take only one break.

And speaking of slow,  we averaged about an 75 minutes between dances whereas last week in Cincinnati we did 4 dances in 2 hours.

Vendors were limited with shoes,  wigs and zucas but there was some jewelry and non-feis Irish apparel.

Sorry Louisville,  but the WTF rating for this years feis is only a 4.5.

Cincinnati Feis Review

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Quick post regarding the Cincinnati Feis that was held on June 10th. I meant to post this right after the feis but had one of those weeks. 

Overall I liked the feis.  It was held at the Cintas Center at Xavier University and the venue was nice.  Lots of seats where you could both camp and view the stages. It was an ‘arena’ so the food was a bit pricey and was the typical fare,  pizza,  hot dogs,  pretzels,  etc….  The vendors were very limited,  shoes and wigs were represented but not much else.

Awards and scoring were handled really well and judges changed frequently which is more fair in this reporters opinion. Awards were listed right next to the stages which was convenient and the results were posted very quickly so kudos to them for that too.

Overall, What The Feis gives this feis a 7.5 out of 10.

Akron Feis Review

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OK, short and sweet, this was the second year I attended the Akron Feis and it is the second year I didn’t like it.

Lets lay it out, the performances are in a barn, unless you are champion level, then you get the AC room. Sure, its a cement floor big barn, but its a barn. It was hot, and a bit smelly and I think it wore on the dancers. On the positive, the camping was adequate.

Concessions – I have to give them a thumbs up. Prices were good and the people were friendly. If there is any downside, it is that it was fair food, but who doesn’t like fair food?

Swag – not too much, a nice jewelry booth and a few Irish things, some tshirts but other than that, limited.

So whats the issue? This year, actually worse than the year before was the scoring. It took literally hours from the dance to the results. EVERYONE was complaining. Mix that with the heat, and the barn etc…. not good.

This post is being written a week after the feis, but I still feel the same. Sorry Akron, we aren’t going back.

Buckeye Feis Review

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I decided that reviewing the most recent feis I attended may be good subject matter for this site. I planned on covering what I thought about the Buckeye Feis this past weekend, including the food, parking, dresses, etc…. but it appears that @IrishDanceMom02 beat me too it. For a great review of the 3rd Annual Buckeye Feis, see her blog post.

There were a few things I was interested in that @IrishDanceMom02 didn’t mention that I thought I would briefly cover. First, the judging. The judges changed frequently which is good. If a judge stays on one stage too long it can harm (or help) a dancers chances for scoring well if the judge happens to have particular style they look for. I know, I have seen it happen. I liked the fact that for the six dances the girl child did, there were 3 different judges, giving all the dancers more even odds.

The music was good and I saw at least 2, and sometimes 3 musicians on a stage. I didn’t look at all the stages but the ones in my area were well covered with fiddles or accordions, sometimes a mix of both, but nary an iPod playing dance music to be found.

And who doesn’t go for the shopping? The SWAG at the event was unfortunately limited, and besides the obligatory shoe, wig and socks tables, there was only one one Irish SWAG table. Being that I am 1st generation Irish American, I really enjoy the Irish SWAG so I was a bit disappointed.

The other thing I thought was missing that would bring more Dads to these events was beer, but I will leave that can of worms for another post.