The 2nd Annual Dairyland Feis was held on Sunday January 19, 2014 at the Olympia Resort and Conference Center in Oconomowoc, WI. The feis was run back to back with the Wisconsin Winter Feis, and so some parts of this review will refer to the review for Saturday’s feis to avoid duplication.
This was our 2nd year attending this feis, and we have generally had a pleasant experience.
Venue
See Wisconsin Winter Feis Review for commentary.
Overall Venue Score: 8/10.
Judges
My dancer danced 6 times and was only seen by 1 judge, and that judge had seen her for 4 of her 6 dances the day before. In my mind, this is totally unacceptable. Even with running by level, judges could have been rotated so the dancers were seen by 3 judges.
Judge Score: 2/10
Music
Our musician had some trouble going back & forth between slow & fast speeds for hard shoe. This caused some trouble for a few dancers, which was unfortunate. (It’s hard for an 8 year old to make a call on the fly when a musician plays 2 bars of the hornpipe at the fast tempo, then switches to slow without restarting – should we start dancing after 8 bars, even though it’s only 6 bars of slow, or should we wait?) We also had some bleed over from the champ stage we were next too, which didn’t help.
Music Score: 6/10
Food
See Wisconsin Winter Feis Review for commentary
Food Score: 7/10
Results/Awards
Results were lightning fast and were also posted on Feisworx real time. We wait until our dancer is done with all her dances before checking any results, so I don’t know how long individual dances were taking to come out, but my dancer’s results were all complete & posted 5 minutes after she finished her last dance.
This feis appeared to be placing only about 30% of the dancers, which is on the less generous side of most mid-America feiseanna. I personally prefer when a feis places a little more generously, but I also realize that 35-40% appears to be the standard in our region. Medals were awarded for 1st-3rd place, and ribbons after that. The medals were on the smaller side, but were nice quality, and the ribbons seemed well made too.
Results/Awards Score: 8/10
Feis Flow
For grades, this feis was run by level. My dancer did not dance until after lunch, but we were on the road home by 4:30, so things moved relatively quickly.
Feis Flow Score: 8/10
Overall Score: 6/10
The average came out to 6.5, but I had to round down due to the complete lack of judge rotation. That really MUST be fixed before next year …
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