FOE 2023 Bardic Competition

## **Prize Categories:**

Best Sung

+  Primarily vocal musical performance. Can be a cappella or accompanied, solo or ensemble.

Best Played

+  Primarily instrumental performance. Can be solo or ensemble.

Best Told

+  Primarily spoken performance. Can be poetry, prose, interpretive dance, etc. Can be comedy, tragedy, history, or some secret fourth thing.

Most Moving

+  To be awarded at the discretion of the judging panel to a performance of any type that made them feel the most feelings (also of any type). May be awarded to a winner of Sung/Played/Told or to a different performer.

Audience Favorite

+  To be voted on by audience token. The emcee has a tiebreak vote if needed. May be awarded to a winner of Sung/Played/Told or to a different performer.

Rookie of the Year

+  To be awarded at the discretion of the judging panel to a performer with relatively little bardic experience as encouragement and congratulations for doing a truly difficult thing! May be awarded to a winner of Sung/Played/Told or to a different performer.

## **Judging Rubric:**

Points will be awarded in three categories for each performance.

Execution

+  Technical Skill. How well did you Do The Thing?

+  0: The Thing Did Not Get Done

+  1: Beginner level – nice job!

+  2: Good, solidly done. It’s clear you know what you’re doing!

+  3: Holy cheese that was impressive

Delivery

+  Performance and/or panache. How well did you Engage The Audience?

+  0: People chatted or fell asleep

+  1: People paid polite attention

+  2: People laughed/cried/engaged on a comfortable level

+  3: People hooted and/or hollered, or were stunned into silence

Ambition

+  Selection of material. Did you pick an easy, medium, or difficult thing to perform?

+  0: Approachable by someone who has never even seen the thing done before

+  1: Could be done well by a performer of any skill level

+  2: Needs some familiarity to be done well

+  3: A tricky thing, needs some focused study to be done well

and will close by 9:15.

## **General Parameters:**

ALL competition performances are limited to 4 minutes!

·      If you have a longer thing please bring it to one of the casual fireside hangouts to share!

A performer may enter multiple categories, but may enter only one performance PER category, and you gotta tell us what that category is before you start!

·      If you want to do more than one thing in a category, pick the one you want to compete with the MOST for this and bring the others to the casual fireside hangouts!

·      A performer may win only ONE of the Sung/Played/Told prizes – if one performer scores highest in multiple categories, they may choose the prize they will claim and the others will go to the next-highest scorer/s.

IF YOU DO NOT WANT THE AUDIENCE TO SING OR CLAP ALONG, you gotta tell us BEFORE you start! Otherwise we might get excited and join in!

IF YOUR PERFORMANCE IS NOT PG, you gotta tell us BEFORE you start so anyone with kids has a chance to bustle off for a few minutes.

ALL competition performances should be genre-appropriate to a Hearthlight event!

·      PROBABLY YES: Fantasy! Pre-gunpowder history! Not-particularly-modern theater! Drunk History-style reimaginings! Any folk music that doesn’t reference obtrusively modern junk! Basically, anything the audience can enjoy without feeling pulled out of The Hearthlight Vibe.

PROBABLY NO: Sci-Fi! Regency period pieces! Modern theater! Alternate Universe remixes of historical stuff that put, like, Plato in a mech suit to rain Socratic hell ona band of Warhammer 40K orcs or something, idk. If you’re not sure whether something’s appropriate, ask Hala (Fish)!

·      This is a bendy rule but does not have unlimited flexural strength – many modern pieces could be just fine, but things like unedited Disney and Broadway covers won’t work without an INCREDIBLY compelling argument, which you may submit to Hala (Fish) for consideration. In triplicate. By EOD yesterday.

There will be a sign-up sheet at Troll starting Friday around 5pm. It will exist at Troll until the A&S Expo on Saturday, when it will move to the Den. It will be there and available for sign-ups until the start of the Bardic Competition at 8pm Saturday and will close by 8:15.