Welcome back to another exciting week on Hooping Idol, our award winning contest leading us all on an ever spinning search to find the planet’s next big hooper star! Our final five are about to go head to head for Performance Week, the final obstacle between them and our amazing Hooping Idol 3 Finale with a shot at the Ultimate Hooping Idol 3 Prize Package worth more than $2500.

For those of you just tuning in here’s what you’ve missed on Hooping Idol 3 thus far. Wemet our 21 finalists for season three and met our four distinguished judges. The first challenge was 90s Dance Hits Week and five hoopers were sent home. Next up Hooping Idol Went Country for Country Week and six more were eliminated, leaving us with our Hooping Idol 3 Top Ten. Next came Fairy Tales Week and 3 were eliminated, followed by
Tribal Week and 2 more were sent home. Which brings us up to the here and now.

Last week our five remaining finalists were given their Hooping Idol 3 Performance Week Assignment. The challenge: perform in front of real live human beings, not just in front of a video camera. Over the course of Hooping Idol our judges have been helping each of our finalists fine tune their hooping and performance skills and the time has arrived to put them to the test. Our finalists were required to find an audience to perform in front of create one of their own providing there was a minimum of ten people in attendance to enjoy the show. And this week we wanted to see an unedited one-take video of that performance, posted with the camera view perspective of an audience member so that what takes place in the video can be seen by all of us just as if we (ie: the camera) were sitting right there in the audience with everyone else witnessing it all first hand.

Now performing can be a lot more complicated than people think and to help facilitate that reality, we gave our finalists some directives to give it a bit more of a real life experience. We told all five of our finalists that they were performing at a White Party and they were to wear white. Guests attending the performance were invited to wear white in solidarity, although they do not have to be wearing white to attend. And given that we don’t always have control over the music we will be performing to, we assigned all five of them the same soundtrack – the brand new single “Ghost” by Pink is Punk & Benny Benassi. It’s a challenging song to perform to in that goes from incredibly intimate and emotional to super high voltage and if anyone knows how to spin this one it’s our Performance Week guest judge Hoopsie Daisy. Hoopsie Daisy – aka Natasha Young of HoopsieDaisy.com – is not only Hooping.org’s Assistant Editor, she has performed with practically every big name DJ on the planet – including Benny Benassi. So we invited her to have a seat at the judges table this week with our usual panelists.

You all know our distinguished panel of judges: Anah “Hoopalicious” Reichenbach of Hoop Revolution, the Canadian whirlwind that is Babz Robinson, global superstar Marawa The Amazingfrom the UK, and legendary hula hooping icon Mat Plendl. They’re sharing their thoughts this season on what all of our finalists are up to, plus they have a vote this year in who will be awarded the title of Hooping Idol and spin away with our Ultimate Hooping Idol Prize Package. What’s in that prize package you ask? Let us tell you all about it. Read more:

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/hooping-idol-3-performance-week/

While Country Week may be over for Hooping Idol, we can all still get our country hoop on whenever we gosh darn feel like it. Take Caitlin Donaghy, for example. She was set for some country hoopin’ and city livin’ when her sister Allison came to visit, only problem was “Is Gon’ Rain!” Rain for them, however, is a good thing. Caitlin says, “It should go without saying that we spent the majority of the time hooping, and of course we made a video! Enjoy us trolololin’ around!” We most certainly did and we think you will too. She lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, and their soundtrack is “Rain is a Good Thing” by Luke Bryan and you can get it on iTunes.

So you find yourself in the mood to do one of your favourite hobbies, but you just can’t decide which one to do first? No need to get flustered and no need to pout. We’ve got the perfect solution for you: just do both of them at the same time! Faith Mahoney is here to demonstrate, with some serious multi-tasking, how to enjoy two of your favourite hobbies at once. Watch as she plays her violin along to the jazz standard “Aint Misbehavin’” while hooping it up. Now that’s talent! She lives in Telford, Tennessee, USA.

(Source: hooping.org)

These days there are a million ways for hoopers to get themselves noticed. You can put on bright colors and hoop in public, get involved and do something like join the Hooping.org team, you can even compete inHooping Idol. Then there’s another option which is a whole lot trickier and rarely ever happens. Your YouTube video can go viral, and when that happens you’re apt to find your world wide web fame extending above and beyond the circumference of the local hoopersphere. For Rachael Lust her sudden hoop fame came very quickly and with not one, but two videos now that have racked up over 600,000 views a piece, we knew it was time to get the hoop scoop on what she’s all about. So join us for an interview with Rachael Lust – our Hooper of the Week. Read more:

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/rachael-lust-inside-the-hoop/

A gorgeous shot of Grace Virant spinning her dream catcher hoop. She lives in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. Photo by Kenneth Levine.

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/grace-virant/

Sometimes when I’m watching the Russians compete in Olympic gymnastics or figure skating I find myself wondering how so much apparently effortless grace could exist in a single person. They just seem to have something. Meet Russian hoop dancer Kseniya Khabarova. Her Hooping.org debut entitled “Like a Feather” is appropriately titled – effortless, weightless, natural, exquisite. It’s as if she’s been in the spin her entire life and it’s so beautifully filmed as well that we’re left in awe. Kseniya lives in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Russian Federation. The video is by Eugene Nezderoff and the soundtrack is unknown.

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/kseniya-khabarova-like-a-feather/

Let’s hit the clubs with DJ Kedzie and hoop marvel Ali Padiak of Feather Hoops who is spinning up something awesome in this video. Filmed by Arthur Ortiz of Foto Moto Photography we pretty much get to feel like we’re there too. The beats and bouncing and the hoops are spinning and we’re all in for a good time. Ali lives in Lake Zurich, Illinois, USA, and the soundtrack for this is “The Gator (Original Mix” by DJ Kedzie and you can download it for your very own boys and girls on Soundcloud.

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/dj-kedzie-and-ali-padiak-spin-it-up/

Tona Moonkitty Willet spins a LED hoop during a photoshoot with photographer Chris Ballance ofBallance Photo. She lives in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. A Hooping.org Photo of the Day.

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/tona-moonkitty-willet/

Mo Bot was having such a great time hooping that she figured she’d share a little slice of her jam session, and we’re really glad that she did because we had such a great time watching her we figured we needed to share it with you as well. She brings so much to one single practice session and she lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and the soundtrack for this is “Mr. Walrus” by The Secret Whistle and you can get a copy of it for yourself on Bandcamp.

http://www.hooping.org/2013/05/mo-bot/