Does anybody know if Waconia got some sort of penalty? Or was the show just that stacked? They have two 1sts and a 2nd since and their performance is one of the best I have seen this year. 5th place is way out of character.
Week 1 is where we see a lot of “screwball” results. Some groups start out really strong and don’t improve much, if at all from performance one. Some groups have a weaker showing at the start, but drastically improve.
Also appears to be a pretty strong lineup, so who knows. Waconia only has one win that caught my attention, and that’s the latest over Hastings. The other ones were against a bunch of groups that I don’t recognize, largely due to not having any affiliation with the region, but no really big name wins outside of that. At least not as big as Linn Marr, Broken Arrow, and Waukee.
I have seen Waconia at two performances this season so far, and can say that they had made huge strides and drastic improvements between them. I saw both them and Hastings last weekend, and it was a quite impressive showing from both choirs.
Some of the best show choirs were there like linn mar. I saw Waconia and they were amazing! I'm a big power company fan but some of these show choirs are way different than other comps.
I was at Kennedy last week as well. Waconia was awesome! Hastings had an incredibly hard performance to judge. I thought it was great, very original, very complex, and for their first competition of the year I was impressed. But my wife hated it, too much theater, not enough show choir. The results had to be very close.
Random question, but what's up with the barefoot groups? From what I can tell, Spectrum, 10th Street Edition, and Eos all do their shows barefoot.. is this a new trend or something? The thought of not only dancing on stage barefoot but also walking around a competition barefoot is very uncomfortable and gross.. maybe that's just me. Any other thoughts on this?
I'm really not trying to sound pessimistic or like a hater, but it's also dangerous right? With the possibility of stepping on broken glass, random stuff backstage, etc.. I'm just very confused why several groups made the choice to perform barefoot.
I think the aesthetic for a lot of the shows these groups are doing makes a lot of sense to be barefoot. It also probably makes dancing much more comfortable.
Thanks for linking this, hadn't seen it yet. If anyone interested in Iowa show choir in general hasn't seen many of the shows from the region the last few years, Matt Warfield's channel has a ton of great recordings from some of their bigger competitions. I've spent more time than I care to admit on his channel
Yeah I understand it for the aesthetic/theme, I guess I'm just not a huge fan of the whole barefoot thing. And yes I agree, his Youtube channel is awesome! As far as shows go, I particularly enjoy 10th Street Edition's show this year (I LOVE Hadestown!) and I can't wait to see how they do this season!
In my view point; ankeny, and groups that do barefoot tend to lean towards choreography that is heavy with technique. You dont really want to be doing a lot of ballet type choreo in shoes just to the nature of lines not looking extended//damage to ankles. Competitive dance typically is barefoot, so I can always appreciate some really difficult//classic dance training choreo
These big Iowa groups are so innovative, its insane. Sometimes I wonder how can you even compare these story shows with "classic show choir" when judging. Vocals are vocals and choreo is choreo, yeah. But in terms of show design, the difference between the two styles is drastic!
Well if you'd like to see Ricky, Ankeny Centennial has a copy of their judging sheet available on their website ("Event Site") above. Neither classic show choir nor story shows are categories on the sheet. Show is a smaller part of the scoring, although weighted more heavily in the finals. With AC's sheet at least, it seems to me both classic and thematic shows have opportunities with difficulty/variation. Alas, that's why the experts have the hard job of making these decisions and, per usual, Ankeny Centennial had a legendary panel of judges.
Yes! This is a stellar panel of judges, 100%. I love both traditional and story based shows. Looking at the score sheet, you are so right that the show category enables both styles to succeed!
They not only fit with the theme of the show but also can make it easier to do some choreography by giving them better control and it helps with friction.
It wasn't the best performance for the prep group and single-gender but the varsity team was way better than years before. The prep groups show is better than years before but it was not their best performance.
A video of 10th Street briefly popped up on YouTube last week. It's pretty unbelievable - any show that beats them is going to be among the best in the country this year.
Off the top of my head I remember "Road to Hell" from Hadestown and "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" being part of their set. They have a student who has an awesome voice, plays fiddle, and dances well. Super great stuff.
It got privated I did save the link in my spreadsheet, but it no longer works. Perhaps it will be republished with the groups official show debut this weekend.
Ankeny Centennial Mid-Iowa Show Choir Championships 2023
I did save the link in my spreadsheet, but it no longer works. Perhaps it will be republished with the groups official show debut this weekend.