Saturday's downpour didn't dampen competitive spirits for 2023 talent show

By Joanne Beck
Jul 31, 2023, 7:55am

Vee and Avantae Owens, Kho — Valeria "Vee" and Avantae Owens, left and center, and Steve, Chelsie and Maisie Kho show their winning medals for the Adult Category in the 2023 Talent Show at Genesee County Fair on Saturday.
Photo by Joanne Beck

A nearly perfect week — at least in terms of no rain clouds to disrupt outdoor fun at Genesee County Fair — ended with a continuous downpour Saturday, muddying the parking lots and puddling the stage for the 2023 talent show.

The weather didn’t dampen the competitive spirits of nearly two dozen contestants, however, including Batavia’s Aria Fox, who was concerned that her hard work might have been for nothing.

“She really likes performing,” her mom Karla said. “She was so excited. She saw the rain, and she goes, ‘I’m so glad they didn’t cancel it.’ I watch her try new things and be comfortable.”

Mom was speaking on behalf of the 6-year-old later Saturday because she had earned a visit to her grandmother’s after her performance. Aria played “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” on piano.

There were several piano entries, plus mostly kids and a few adults playing the flute, violin, dancing, singing, and leading a cheer.

Isabella Danahy, 12, performed a solo cheer routine, and her younger sister Marilyn played the classic “Fur Elisse” on piano. They also played a duet of “Mary Had a Little Lamb” with Isabella on flute and 10-year-old Marilyn on piano.

“I was nervous. I didn’t really like doing stuff in front of people,” Marilyn said, explaining why she pushed herself to participate. “So I can get over that fear.”

Both girls take band at school in Cheektowaga. They knew about the talent show through their teacher and show organizer, Laura Kauppi of Corfu.

"I think it makes me more confident,” Isabella said.

Sabrina Sanner of Pembroke was looking for those signs of confidence and other winning attributes while scoring as the single judge for the event since 2019. With two degrees in music education, having taught full orchestra and band in school and teaching private music lessons in voice and piano, she brings it all to the table when each contestant walks up on stage.

First, it depends on what they’re performing, she said.

“Some of it is the difficulty level, like the person who won the tiny tots category. She did two hands, stayed in time, had all of her things in the right place. She did very well. And it was more complicated than the other pieces that were played. So like, obviously, she did something harder. And she did it very well,” Sanner said. “When it comes to things like judging dance against music, it depends on how well they do the dance versus how well they play their song. I did learn from the back, when we used to have a panel, how to judge dances and stuff like that because I'd asked them questions on how they were doing. And it's how well they're smiling, you know, where their movements are with the music, how much impact it has on you watching them, which is a very kind of hard thing to judge. So I've learned a lot from the other past judges that we've had on how to do this.”

This was the first year she’s had to judge a cheerleading routine, but she also brought some experience for that task too.

“I used to do cheerleading, so I also know about that. It is hard to cross-judge them. But as I said, it's the difficulty. So I do know a lot about the difficulty levels of everything that they were doing and has to do with how well they're doing. You know, with cheerleading, it's like how straight your limbs are; there were a lot of her jumps where her legs are still bent or something like that,” Sanner said. “And with music, it's like, if you pause while you're playing, you're not supposed to do that, or if you hit a wrong note, and I don't think anybody really had any wrong notes this year, which was impressive also. But stuff like that. So you kind of just see where people are kind of missing things in their performance, and then go by which ones are bigger, like with dancing, it's smiling is a really huge one. So if they're not smiling, you get a lot off for that.

“But I've been doing this for a while. I judge other things too. So other events. Yeah, the studio I work for and teach privately for they do a competition every year,” she said. “And I've obviously like gotten kids ready for music competitions and stuff for years and years now.”

One new challenge this year was the unrelenting rain. The talent show is under the yellow and white entertainment tent, yet still — water pooled on the ground around the stage and on top of it. Sometimes a judge has to take Mother Nature’s effects into consideration when rating a performer, she said.

“I don’t think it's ever been this bad. I do think it rained a few years ago, but it's definitely never been on the stage like this,” she said. “The three dancers … the middle girl who had that solo, her flags got all wet when they were sitting on the floor. So I did take that into consideration that their flags weren't moving the way they were supposed to because they were weighed down.”

Kauppi was very pleased with the turnout, not only the number of kids but the quality of their skills, she said. There were several winners, and everyone received a goodie bag for participating.

“The students are all extremely talented people, they’ve worked really hard this year. I know some families started their work on this year's (talent show) at the end of last year. So people were really excited to perform. And it was amazing to have everybody come out despite the rain and the challenges that the rain brought technology-wise,” Kauppi said. “I ended up grabbing a new speaker this morning because I wanted a speaker that was absolutely waterproof. And that (pointing to the one she chose) is super waterproof.”

And the winners were: