Ok, so we are going to our very 1st Nationals this year!!! Yay! Question is: What is your fave Regionals/Nationals Competition??? (Would love to see the responses, wherever you may live!)

Our studio's favorite Regional Competitions are:

-Starbound
-Starpower
-Access Broadway
-Hall of Fame
-Kids Artistic Revue

(Has anyone been to any of the above Nationals?)

We went to a Starbound Nationals. that was the only year that we did that comp. There has been negative things written about Starbound, but I am still torn. They are not very organized, but I thought that they were very fair with their judging. They also had some really fun workshops at nationals.

We love KAR, but have not done their nationals.
I would not return to Hall of Fame, regional or national....i think that they award too much hootch.

It's not on your list, but my favorite National is Spotlight Dance Cup. We had a blast a Disneyland this year!!! The workshops were amazing too! And the judges were very fair and had great techniques! They had a wonderfully energetic closing day, and it made my whole studio (partents included) want to come back. I would highly recommend this comp. We learned so much at this comp, met great people and we were highly inspired by the other groups there.

Well, I guess this was a great post idea then-I never heard of Spotlight...that sounds great and I would love more information! Do they have a website? Thanks!

spotlightevents.com

We love em!

I love showstopper regionals and nationals. I would not recommend Hall of Fame or starpower.

I 2nd showstoppers!

I'm from the midwest so we don't get a lot of competitions around here, but we really like Showstoppers and Talent on Parade.
I didn't care for Sophisticated Productions.
The kids LOVE Jump and WCDE conventions. I know that's not part of the question, but we like those workshops.

I'm from Long Island as well (East Islip) and there are SO many competitions held right there at the high school. Dance Xplosion is a great one as is Dance Rave and KAR. Starpower is wayyyy to big and crazy and disorganized!! We have also done IDC (International Dance Challenge), ADA (American dance Awards) Headliners and Starbound. Good Luck

Does anyone know if Showstoppers comes to the NY area? I know there are a lot of competitions that only travel to certain areas of the country...

Also, I forgot to include "Which is your favorite convention?" into my original post...ours is Shock, which we are doing this Sunday...and we also love Tremaine!

Most you know I will never give one more penny to Hall of Fame. I have a friend who judges for them and told me she was told to be gentle on her scoring. She was given a list of what schools had the most numbers and to be more relaxed with the point system with them.....yuck!

I love Tremaine!!!!!!! The best and they only give 1st 2nd 3rd no super duper sparkly platinum times a billion awards.

The Power of Dance is not adjudicated either, plus you choose a charity to dance for and could win 5 Grand for your charity. It does go to Long Island.

I've tried this kind of question before and it's so funny how there is never a consenus. Someone else likes DancXplosion, I wouldn't go back if you paid me!

I would never ever ever return to hall of fame!! They seemed to judge on how revealing the dances and costumes are, never on technique or creativity. Love KAR that one has always been a good one.

Can someone please tell me what other experiences you've had with Hall of Fame that were so bad? I'm very curious, as we've never had a problem with them, and our students are not scantily dressed, and we do not compete with 50 routines! Everyone seems to have a story, and I just want to know why they have such a bad rep!

For me, personally with HOF, I knew that we weren't going to go in there and sweep it by any means (although we did get a couple of top 4 placements). But I do sit and watch all the dances. And when I saw what dances got the overall scores, i was amazed! They went to the same two studios, and the dances were not that great choreographically. Yes, the kids had great unison and extension, but every dance could have been done to any song. I just was not impressed by the lack of creativity that these studios had, and then the fact that HOF thought that they were the best. There was one studio there that I thought was FANTASTIC. There choreography was original, interesting, difficult and done VERY WELL and with great technique. The dancers obviously were connected with all their dances and they never got past 3rd or 4th overall. The comp in general just left a bad taste in my mouth (and my husband refused to sit in the auditorium alone because about every 2nd or 3rd dance was completely inappropriate....done by the top two studios....they had a lot of dances.)
So that is my personal experience with HOF. I will stick to Spotlight and KAR. They embrace what I try to teach my dancers and they are companies I have no problem giving my money to because of it.

I have not had a very good experience with Starpower....they reward age inappropriate dances and weigh heavily on "tricks" and not so much on dance...if you can "booty-pop" and throw a back tuck, and shake some more, then it is the place for you.

Showstopper is always a quality competition, but be prepared for the competition...Highly competitive on the east coast, but a great experience--fair and fun. Workshops are nice too.

Nexstar-- If their competitions are small, they will start calling the big studios and telling them how they will "clean up" if they show up... I really didn't appreciate this at all.

Applause-- they really like interesting choreography-- technique is important to them too. They are pretty organized and fair, but they need to work on their awards ceremonies-- not nearly as nice as showstopper, but could be with a little work. Their workshops are great.

I would like to know more specifics about KAR, esp. nationals..anyone?

Well, I did have an experience with HOF with one studio that basically did the same routine to different music-it really got ridiculous, but I felt that the judges were aware of the lack of creativity. The school did not do very well overall. I wouldn't say that we "clean up" there, but we do always get special awards and high score awards. And like I said, we don't put our students out on stage with bras bedazzled from Victoria's Secret. I am, however, definately going to take a closer look at them this year, as I really do not notice the things I keep hearing about HOF.

By the way, anybody here do a Nationals with KAR? There seem to be a lot of people asking...including me! Would love your input!