Just wondering everyone's opinions on Hall of Fame and StarPower competitions. Might be trying these this year. Are they organized? Run fairly (no favoritism to who pays the most money)? Pretty true to their rules?

I have never competed at Hall of Fame but they held one close to me this year and I went to watch it because I am considering taking my studio. I was very impressed. They seemed to be very prganized. They never ran behind schedule in fact I think they were about an hour ahead of schedule. The talent there was amazing and the girls that I took with me just loved the mc they thought he was funny and not cheesy like some tend to be. The awards seemed to be very fair. Everyone that won deserved it. I wasn't directly involved but as an observer it was a great competition. I went to the one in Atlanta.

Hall of Fame is a wonderful competition. They are known for being on or ahead of schedule at all times. The staff is super friendly and INCREDIBLY organized. I found adjudication to be fair 95% of the time. Nationals were equally well run.

Well worth the money. Will definately go back again.

I only had an issue with HOF one year and it was because of another studio being divas and re-choreographing backstage (making everyone else and hr late)...it had nothing to do with the HOF staff. I would recomend this over starpower. Starpower is VERY political.

My only complaint for both is that smuttier dances tend to be the higher scorers. you can see plenty of that if you look at the winning videos on Hall of Fame's website. The last time we went to Starpower I was appalled at the bumping & grinding, and even more appalled when those dances won.

Hall of Fame I will not enter because it does not stop smutty dances.

StarPower is very political and does award big paying studios for being big paying studios. I went twice and not again. They also run so late!!

We did starpower every year for probably 10 years. I feel like it just got too big to be well managed, and it is very political. The last year we went there were over 1500 entries. Yes, one thousand five hundred entries. There is no way for the judging to be fair when the poor judges are watching 1500 dances.

dancequalslife wrote:

There is no way for the judging to be fair when the poor judges are watching 1500 dances.

Yes, with that amount of entries, rotating judges would be nice, at any competition. It is just too big... but it's about money!

Thanks guys for all your input! Now I know what to expect and what to watch out for! If you have anything else, please keep it coming!

If you're a Canadian studio, DON'T go to Hall of Fame. I'm sure they treat American studios well but I know of 7 studios who attended various locations (regionals and nationals) and none of them went back. Canadian studios are not a big source of income to them so they treat them terribly and are quite political in that sense. That being said, I do know of 2 Canadian studios who back year after year, so who knows.... just my 2 cents and my experiences with them.

they're both political competitions & do not punish smutty dancing. Cathy Roe's Ultimate Dance is my favorite & they will disqualify smutty dances & take points off etc... They are more into the artistry of the dance & not so much the tricks etc...

I've been going to Hall of Fame for several years and had and OK experience until last year. They were having their competition about 1 hr from our city, with no traffic. They ran 2 HOURS early at one point. As soon as we arrived we started calling our students at telling them to COME NOW. I talked and talked to them and they would not hold back the competition. One routine didn't even get to perform as they were last before the awards and they wouldn't hold it more than 30 min (even though it was 1.5 hrs before awards were scheduled).

Also, I had a problem with the facility they had the competition as well. As they were running so far ahead, my groups had like 5 to do right at the end, back to back, so frantic changing. When we went to watch the first one and came back the maintenance people had come through and "cleaned" and threw away all our bobby pins, hair nets, water and food. Then they came it to take all the tables and chairs, and started moving our stuff to the floor! I had it when two MEN walked in to move tables.... I freaked! I told them to get out that this was a DRESSING ROOM when girls are changing. Then the lady with them started getting an attitude with me and rolling her eyes... Hilarity insued as I got in her face and went diva on her! My students always bring it up and say I was their hero!

Regardless, when I told Hall of Fame about it they acted concerned but did nothing!

My students/parents begged to not return. They now call it "Hall of Lame".

Hall of Lame! I love it! From now on that is what I will call it as that is how I have always felt.

After watching some of their online videos, I call them "Hall of Shame."

Our studio went to the Hall of Fame regionals and Nationals this last year. Our experience at the regionals was so horrible we almost backed out of the nationals right after.

They ran horribly over, we're talking more than an hour and a half. They had way too many entries from 3 huge schools. At one point, we felt like we were watching a one studio in particular's dance recital.

It's a huge competition and it draws a lot of the bigger more advanced studios sure, so viewing the competition can be fun, but come on, wasting time doing stupid gimmicks like "everyone on stage let's do the Cupid Shuffle" stuff just to allow other studios changing times due to too many entries...annoying.

The judging was a little harsher, maybe because there were so many amazing young dancers who were like 5 years doing perfect turns in second and gymnastic moves so what are you going to do?

Our studio was always ready, on time, and efficient. Yet we were snapped at by the staff backstage and "thrown" on to stage at the last minute many times because the competition needed a dance onstage pronto. As a result, many of our parents missed their child dancing because the time frame was off. Very annoying.

We had a great time at StarQuest and their entry fees are cheaper. We are doing StarQuest's dance nationals this year instead. Hope this helps.

We tried StarQuest last year and also liked it so are doing it again this year.

I agree with everyone above about StarPower - we did it for two years and never again! They were completely unorganized - you just went backstage and told them you were ready to go on. I didn't get half of my critiques and their "amazing video critiques" were not so amazing considering the video camera was broken for half the competition. One of my parents wrote on our annual survey that the judges "seem to reward dancers who wear less clothing". That is not what I want our kids or parents to take away from a competition.

We had a terrible experience with Hall of Fame too. It was run fairly well, but horribly political. An employee's old dance studio was there so needless to say they did well. Too bad. I thought the venue and the set up was really nice. We won't be back. We considered Star Power, but after reading this post, it doesn't make sense to swap one bad egg for another one. So who runs a good, clean, fair show these days?