Feis ATL – What The Feis

Feis ATL was held November 18, 2017, at the Renaissance Waverly Marriott, in Atlanta, GA. This feis is hosted by the Drake School of Irish Dance. Usually, this means fun, fabulous, crowded, and chaotic. Thankfully, this new venue handled the crowds and chaos beautifully. See also Venue.

VENUE: 10 out of 10

The Renaissance Waverly Marriott was a new experience for the Wilkes family. Hotel feisanna are not my favorite. This hotel convention center was a surprise. The ballrooms were large enough to handle the crowds. Music carry over was not an issue. Bathrooms were kept cleaned and stocked. Ash had a couple of options for his feis coffee, which made the feis more pleasant for the entire family. For younger siblings, there were a few entertaining options. Besides the escalators in the lobby, Feis ATL used a rented ballroom to show How to Train Your Dragon. Those staying in the hotel also had the option of a heated indoor pool.

PARKING: 8 out of 10

Plenty of hotel parking, at $10 a day hotel rate. The parking lot flow was confusing and poorly marked. This led to problems in navigating the lots. We encountered this upon leaving, not entering. Otherwise, it was a welcome change from the usual challenges of Atlanta parking.

FOOD: 7 out of 10

Great feis specific menu with reasonable prices. Personal pan pizzas for $5, which is the same as our local pizza spot. They also had sandwich plates, fresh fruit, and snack bags at the feis. The down side? Long service wait time, if you ordered at the bar or restaurant.

MUSIC: 7 out of 10

Pianist, violinist, accordianist. Thankfully, the violinist had a beat box hooked up the speaker system. Which was neccesary, considering he was covering music for 3 stages. There was no music carry over, that we noticed. One of our little darlings danced only with the violinist. Another one danced twice on the stages with an accordianist. Champ dancers were largely in a separate ballroom, accompanied by a pianist. Personally, I think they should have moved the violinist to cover a single stage, moved the accordionist to cover the 3 stage room, and put the pianist in the room covering two stages.

JUDGING: 7 out of 10

At a perfectly judged feis, in my opinion, each dance would have a different judge. This feis came close. Close, but no cigar. Two of our darlings danced for 3 different judges. One of our darlings danced for 2 different judges.

RESULTS: 7 out of 10

IFeis kept results coming out in a timely manner. This is the first iFeis feis we have attended that we have not encountered an issue with results, or of using the website at the feis. Their including information sheets with competition numbers probably had something to do with our personal success. Results were posted in a timely manner. They did not award top 50% in most competitions, which was confusing to us. Especially considering that a majority of the competitions contained 15 or more dancers. For example, in a traditional set competition with 10 dancers, only the top 4 were placed.

AWARDS: 8 out of 10

The awards of Drake competitions are usually fun and fabulous. This feis was no exception. Georgia Renaissance fair representatives assisted in giving out the championship awards. Some vendors sponsored championship awards. Top three were given CHAMPION scarves, sashes, and plaques. First place champions also received blankets. Grades received Feis ATL medals with green neck ribbons. Prizewinner, traditional set, and treble reel received Feis ATL star trophies.

VENDORS: 10 out of 10

Wigs
Irish dance supplies
Shoes
Dress resale rack
Just about anything an Irish dancer might need, or want, was available for purchase.
Two vendors carried genuine Cadbury chocolate, so I have decided to give the vendors my highest score. Any time I can buy genuine Cadbury, Is a good time.

FEIS FLOW: 7 out of 10

This would have been higher, if the feis program book had arrived on time. Program books were available for pre order on iFeis.net. All of the details of the feis extras were contained within the feis program books. It told about the music and vocal competitions. It also gave the schedule for the movie showing, the evening Renaissance themed cocktail party, and themed events for the Sunday Hotlanta feis. These would have been very helpful, if they had arrived on time for registration Friday evening. We were not given one until Saturday afternoon.
Stages were run smoothly, which often happens with tablet check ins available with iFeis. Adjudication seemed to be done with relaxed manner on one of the grades stages, as we saw a young dancer approach and speak with an adjudicator on more than one occasion.

SOCIAL MEDIA: 6 out of 10

There is a public Facebook group for Feis ATL and Hotlanta. There is also a feis website. Both of these are updated periodically. They are also quick to respond to questions posted by potential attendees. Unfortunately, it was not utilized during the feis, to announce changes or the themed schedule. IFeis kept the feis stages updated on their website. This was easier to use, and loaded faster, than we have experienced previously. The lateness of the feis schedule posting certainly brought out comments on Facebook and other forums.

TOTAL: 8 out of 10

Feis ATL was held November 14th and 15th of 2014, at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. This was a Drake feis, which means fun, fabulous, chaotic, and crowded. The feis offered competitions in musical instruments, vocals, Celtic art work, baking, traditional and non traditional sets, treble reels, and a Dancer of the Day award, in addition to the regular feis competition schedule.

In the tradition of fun and fabulous, this feis offered some unexpected surprises. Friday night, there was a casual Irish music session in the registration hall. On Saturday, the FROZEN princesses made appearances and lead a pre awards show sing-a-long. On Saturday night, they held a post feis luau at the hotel pool for feis attendees.

Venue

This was a hotel feis. As most readers know, I am not a fan of the hotel feis. This location is no exception to that dislike. Although the building did receive the vomitus mass of people attending the feis, it did nothing to organize them. The hotel is currently undergoing renovations. So, it was challenging to attend. From parking to conference room location, the construction chaos only added to the usual feis chaos. The hotel did have helpful staff, when you could find them. The bathrooms were kept clean and were not overcrowded. The hallways were large and spacious throughout. This allowed for movement between stages, even with any available wall space being crowded with bags, personal items, small siblings, etc. Camping, as it is known in the Mid America and other regions, does not take place in the majority of Southern Region feisanna. The feis did an excellent job marking the awards room and decorating the registration booth. At least those spaces were the easiest for us to find.

5 out of 10

Parking

Welcome to downtown Atlanta! Parking is plentiful and expensive. If you did not mind a chilly 6 block walk, you could park for $3 a day. To park at the feis, it was $12 a day. The feis did offer attendees a special parking rate. If you forgot to mention you were there for the feis, it was a whopping $28 per day. Also, the parking deck at the hotel filled quickly. Some people were upset to learn of there being no elevator to the highest deck level. Can you imagine lugging all that gear down the steps to the nearest elevator for a luggage cart? We can’t either. So, we suggest an earlier arrival next year, for a prime parking deck location. In a perfect world, out of town arrival to Atlanta should take place between 10 am and 2:30pm EST. Also, avoid the 75/85 merge at all costs.

5 out of 10

Music

Why so high? The accordion, that’s why. Every stage, we watched, had a blessed, talented, accordionist playing accompaniment. Was there music carry over? Very little. The stages were so spaced out, you only heard the other stages music if you were close to a doorway.

10 out of 10

Feis Food

The hotel cafe was close to $4 for a cup of coffee. When the feis had the hotel set up coffee in the vendor hall, it was $2 a cup. Any feis where Ash Wilkes can get his feis coffee is a good one. Of course, the remainder of the hotel cafe options were Disney FROZEN expensive. $5 for a parfait. $3.50 for a frozen pizza sized slice of pizza. $9 for chicken fingers and fries. It was a very chilly walk for anyone to find outside options. A sub shop was close by. Many families sent Feis Dads out on sub runs.

4 out of 10

Vendors

The feis had a good selection of vendors. The down side was that they did not stay open through the conclusion of the feis. So, if you wanted to buy a t-shirt or sock glue after the awards ceremony, too bad. They had closed up shop hours before hand. Also, no Cadbury bars. Sniff. Sniff.

Züca sales
Wigs
Shoes/socks
Feis shirts
Jewelry
Irish, Celtic, and Feis themed items
Photo crystal dancers gifts/Speakers

6 out of 10

Results

Heard of being on Southern time? This feis ran on Southern Irish Feis Time. So. Hope everyone was able to find the punch in the lobby, because you had a wait on your hands. From the time of competition to the time of results posting was an hour or more in most cases. The average we worked out was 45 minutes. The results were quick to post at the start of the day, but really lagged as the day went on. We saw dancers camped under their results papers for them to post, so that they could go home. See also Feis Flow.

3 out of 10

Awards

This was a Drake feis, remember? The fabulous part certainly comes in at the awards. No dinky trinkets here. Medals, with neck ribbons were awarded to all grades with a posted result. So, even if your little prince or princess won 5th out of 15, they went home with a medal around their neck. Prizewinner, and above, received trophies. The star with the Feis ATL logo decorated most of them. Again, even with a 5th place out of 15 in traditional set, the dancer went home with a trophy. Championship competitions had recalls posted. Their awards were given at a ceremony, after the feis competitions ended. Everyone on stage received a trophy. First place Open Champs recived a sash, Olaf stuffie, trophy, and a CHAMPION emblazoned scarf. Some second and third place winners were also given the CHAMPION scarves. Only Open Champs received the sashes for first place. The awards ceremony was a great lead up to the Southern Region Oireachtas. Sound system, projection screen, podium with five placements, music, ambient lighting, and pre show FROZEN sing along. (Alright, so the last part was at least fun for the kids who were waiting…now, let it go.) of course, the awards ceremony did not finish until 8pm. But, like I said, it was a great lead up to the Southern Region Oireachtas. Midnight award ceremony conclusions, anyone?

10 out of 10

Judging

This is one area of the feis where many people were displeased. Three of our four little darlings had ZERO judge rotation. That’s right. The same judge for every. single. dance. In one case, it worked to their advantage. In the other two cases, it did not. Our youngest darling had some judge rotation. One judge for two dances, then a different judge/different stage for the other two dances. At a perfect feis, there would be a different judge for each dance. The opposite was true at this feis. With over 850 competitors, there was an enormous push for speed on the stages. They did everything but add a conveyor belt to the stage floor. See also Feis Flow.

3 out of 10

Feis Flow

They billed this feis as the FROZEN feis. Considering the weather, and the open exterior doors in the vendors area, we think they succeeded in making everyone FROZEN on Friday night. Thankfully, they also had a warm Irish music session occurring away from the open exterior doors by registration. With more than 850 competitors, along with their various friends and relations, the body heat generated helped to warm the competition halls on Saturday. Keeping the exterior doors closed helped, too.

The feis volunteers were working hard from 7am until 9pm on feis day. That being said, it appeared to be the same 20 or so people the entire day. Stages were only marked by the stage side podium. That information was not up until almost 8am. Of course, if you bought the unadvertised on eFeis $5 feis book, a map was included. The stages were also at one end of cavernous conference halls. Most of them were set up long ways, so that there were plenty of chairs. But only the first ten rows of people could see anything. Also, some of the stage rooms were extremely crowded. The preliminary championship stage was overrun with dancers, friends, and relations until after 2pm. The stages that ran quickly were “rewarded” by having more competitions shifted over to them. This movement created flow mayhem, as dancers and their entourage were scrambling to find the new stage location and seats for the competitions. The awards ceremony for the championship dancers occurred after the final competition ended for the day. The ceremony was a bit chaotic, as many of the later competition recall lists were posted in the middle of the ceremony.

When the feis completed on Saturday night, there was a luau for feis attendees at the hotel pool. Snacks, finger foods, and a cash bar made for an excellent end to a busy feis day.

5 out of 10

Overall Score: 6 out of 10

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