Historic Savannah Feis: Irish Dancers Rock the South Again!

The Irish Dancers of Savannah hosted the 6th Historic Savannah Feis on August 6, 2012, at the Savannah Civic Center. With eight stages and the Ladies Ancient Order of Hibernians on hand to assist feis-goers, the hostess city of the South, Savannah, could not have offered a better or more-organized Irish dancing competition for Southern Region Irish dancers and their families!

Preliminary and Open Champion Results as tabulated and posted on-line by eFeis are limited to Irish dance school names and competitor numbers. Top Ten Schools in each competition are listed here, but we invite you to comment with the names of the dancers who placed.

Special congratulations to the dancers in Prelim under 14 and under 17 and Open Men under 18 who earned a perfect 300 score from the adjudicators!

Prelim under 8:

Mulligan, GA 1

Rince na h'Eireann NC 2

Hunt MD 3

Prelim under 10:

Drake School 1 and 5 and 7

Breffni Academy FL 2

Leneghan Academy OH 3

Tir na Greine, FL 4

Rince na h'Eireann NC 6

Danny Tighe NC 8

Prelim under 12: Special thanks to Feis America's FaceBook friend Karen Renee Smit-Daley!

Glor na Daire 1

Maple VA 2

Inis Cairde 3

Mulligan 4
Drake 5

Stephen Scariff FL 6

Rince na h'Eireann NC 7

Prelim under 14:
Drake School 1 with a perfect score of 300!

Rince na h'Eireann NC 2, 3 and 4

Leneghan Academy OH 5

Drake School 6

Stephen Scariff FL 7

Inis Cairde NC 8

Walsh Kelley, NC 9

Broesler, Maryland 10

Prelim under 16a:

Breffni Academy FL 1

Glor na Daire GA 2 and 5

Rince na h'Eireann NC 3

Mulligan, GA 4

Inis Cairde NC 6 and 10

Drake School 7

Katie Cox TN 8

King O'Sullivan GA 9

Prelim under 16b:

King O'Sullivan, GA 1

Breffni Academy FL 2

Walsh Kelley, NC 3 and 8

Drake School 4 and 6 and 7

Watters School, FL 5

Glor na Daire GA 9

Rince na h'Eireann NC 10

Prelim under 17:

Rince na h'Eireann NC 1 with a perfect score of 300!

Tir na Greine FL 2 and 4

Glor na Daire GA 3

Mulligan, GA 5

Prelim 17 & Over:

Drake School 1

Glor na Daire GA 2 and 8

Rince na h'Eireann NC 3

Tir na Greine, FL 4 and 6 and 7

Stephen Scariff FL 5

Open under 10:

Rince na h'Eireann NC 1

Breffni Academy FL 2

Open under 12:

Stephen Scariff FL 1

Mulligan, GA 2

Maple VA 3

Open under 14:

Mulligan, GA 1

Rince na h'Eireann NC 2

Watters School FL 3 and 4 and 5

Niall O'Leary NY 6

Stephen Scariff FL 7

Drake School 8 and 9 and 10

Open under 16:

Drake School 1

Rince na h'Eireann NC 2

King O'Sullivan, GA 3

Glor na Daire GA 4 and 5 and 6 and 8 and 9

Watters School FL 7 and 10

Open under 18 Ladies:

Drake School 1

McGinley FL 2

Glor na Daire GA 3T

Watters School FL 3T and 4

Yeates Academy FL 5

Breffni Academy FL 6

Open under 18 Men:

Glor na Daire GA 1 with a perfect score of 300!
Rince na h'Eireann NC 2 and 3

Open 18 & Over:

Rince na h'Eireann NC 1 and 2

Drake School 3 and 5 and 6

Watters School FL 4

Henry and Andrew Snead from Rince na h'Eireann (NC/SC)

Top Three Girls under 8 Preliminary Championship

Molly and Sarah Barton, Kierstin Finch and Maddie Loper

Scott Johnson, Savannah Wells and Erin Kaukereit

Glor na Daire (GA) friends and fans for life!

All photos by Madison Daley exclusively for Feis America LLC

For more Irish dancing news from Feis America, North America's favorite Irish dancing magazine, delivered to your mailbox, subscribe today!

Irish Dance as a Family Passion with National Champions

"Grandma Jane" with Megan Ferrara

from Harney (MA)

Sisters and dancers Abbey, Berkley and Tinsley Griffin from Glor na Daire (GA)
Grandmother Jean Mullane with Godley siblings Orla, Sinead and Grace
from Mullane-Healy-Godley (IL)

Future Champion Dancer with her doting Feis Daddy

Drew Lovejoy with mom Andee

from McGing (OH)

Anyone remotely familiar with a champion Irish dancer knows that it’s a family passion! This makes sense given the strong cultural ties the Diaspora has to Ireland, and the nature of the Irish family. Many Irish dance schools have multiple siblings in class, and every feis offers a ‘family cap’ for registration and competition fees. Whether it’s one of the famous families we’ve featured on a Feis America cover, or one flying under the radar until we see them on stage together, it means a commitment by everyone in the family when a dancer or two is a champion.

Enjoy these photos of some of the siblings and parents at the North American Irish Dance Championships in Nashville!


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Countdown to North American Irish Dancing Championships!

2010 Stephen Scariff School (FL) NAN ceili team
2010 Rince na Tiarna (NY) NAN ceili team
2010 Penk O'Donnell (WC) NAN ceili team

2010 O'Rourke School (NY) NAN ceili team

2010 Glor na Daire (GA) NAN ceili team

2010 NAN Under 9 Girls' solo competitors waiting to dance

In just one week, thousands of dancers, their families and teachers will converge in Nashville, Tennessee for the Irish Dance Teachers Association of North America Irish Dancing Championships! These photos by Feis America LLC are of some of our friends who competed at last year's 2010 NAIDC in Orlando, Florida.

Good luck to everyone getting ready to travel and best wishes to the organizers from IDTANA who are busy finalizing details. Keep your eye here on Go Feis The Irish Dance Blog for more inspiring photos all week long and visit us at the Feis America on IrishCentral.com table on Monday, July 4th in Nashville!

Orlando Feis 2011 Champion Results

Drake School dancers show off their trophies from the Orlando Feis.
Photo: Tessa McKenna


Orlando Feis
May 22, 2011
Orlando, Florida
Host: The Watters School

Results tabulated by FeisWorx.com





PRELIMINARY CHAMPION RESULTS:

Preliminary Champion under 10
1 Harris, Lily (Breffni Academy)
2 Murray, Nora (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)
3 Spellman, Sara (Tir na Greine)

Preliminary Champion under 12
1 Flynn, Sophia (Corrigan School of Irish Dance - EC)
2 Brown, Kaylee (Breffni Academy)
3 Cottle, Daphne (Drake)
4 Daley, Brooke (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)
5 Buttery, Riley (Tir na Greine)
5 Wozniak, Sarah (Petri - NY)

Preliminary Champion under 14
1 Davis, Emily (Hogan School of Irish Dance)
2 Keller, Brian (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)
3 Hiles, Zach (Drake)
4 Bennetti, Rowan (Tir na Greine)
5 Homan, Ainsley (Corrigan School of Irish Dance - EC)
6 Waterman, Ciara (Walsh Kelley School)

Preliminary Champion under 15
1 Calnan, Kylie (Breffni Academy)
2 Lombardy, Georgia (Watters)
3 Boogaerts, Sarah (Watters)
4 Zawacki, Emma (An Rince Mor)
5 Finnegan, Hunter (Tir na Greine)

Preliminary Champion under 16
1 Cherniak, Conner (McGinley Academy, Eastern Canada/FL)
2 Edmiston, Emily (McGinley Academy, Eastern Canada/FL)
3 Desmond, Karaleigh (Cunniffe Academy - MA)
4 Agrios, Ariana (Hogan School of Irish Dance)
5 Mitsopoulos, Christina (Bremer School - MA)
6 Hiles, Katie (Drake)

Preliminary Champion 16 & Over
1 Nemeth, Juliana (Rondeau School of Irish Dancing)
2 Farrell, Toni (Breffni Academy)
3 Cier, Catherine (Drake)
4 Farrell, Katherine (Tir na Greine)
5 Hopman, Emily (Watters)
6 Persons, Courtney (Tir na Greine)
7 Cullen, Shea (Watters)

OPEN CHAMPION RESULTS:

Open Champion u10
1 Swikehardt, Aubrey (Breffni Academy)

Open Champion u12
1 Schwyn, Keady (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)

Open Champion u14
1 Magliaro, Macy (Watters)
2 Sardin, Kaitlyn (Watters)
3 Lazzaro, Anna (Watters)
4 Monahan, Bridget (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)

Open Champion u16
1 Murray, Roisin (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)
2 Velez, Ashley Ann (Petri)
3 Persons, Christopher (Tir na Greine)
4 McLaughlin, Emily (Doyle Academy)
5 Buchelli, Julia (Watters)
6 DeSaussure, Bailey (Comerford Alaska)
7T Baron, Allie (Watters) and Sliwinski, Erin (Glor na Daire)

Open Champion u18
1 Barton, Molly (McGinley Academy, Eastern Canada/FL)
2 Marcinowski, Courtney (Watters)
3 Lotspeich, Sarah (Watters)
4 King, Cara (Stephen Scariff School of Irish Dance)
5 Harper, Danielle (Watters)
6 Roca, Joey (Glor na Daire-GA)
7 Domingo, Maggie (Drake)
8 Chimitris, Lauren (Dillon-Gavin)
9 Szente, Kaytee (Leneghan Academy of Irish Dance)

Open Champion 18 & Over
1 Wheaton, Samantha (Watters)
2 O'Neill, Caitlin (Breffni Academy)
2 Palermo, Patricia (Tir na Greine)
4 Cumbie, Anna (Rince Na h'Eireann - NC/SC)


Congratulations to all the dancers and the Watters School families for putting on a terrific event in the capital of FUN, Orlando!