Fanoos caught up with Andalee of California to ask all about event production.
1. Tell us about the events that you have run/ currently run. What got you started?
I started organizing events in 2007 with the help and support of my future husband, Mike Owens. I started with producing haflas for my students and other local guest artists. It turned out that the area I live in was ready for these collaborative events, and they were successful from the beginning.
From there, I started to bring fabulous guest artists for a workshop weekend and show. Karim Nagi was among the first in 2008!
I have always taken pride in being an organized type organizer! Attendees were happy to attend my events, artists felt valued, therefore I was able to grow the size of events I was producing.
In 2016 Mike and I were in the middle of a road trip and came up with the idea for our festival; focused on community, education, professional development, music, all the good luxe vibes, and of course, lots of dancing! A dancer friend of mine, Joy Mohler, had previously come up with the name Hot Raqs as a nod to how hot it gets here in the Central Valley of California. I loved the sound of it and received permission to use that name for our big central California festival.
Hot Raqs was born and had a beautiful eight year run in Clovis, CA, celebrating MENAT music and dance! This summer of 2024 was our final festival style event and we went big with headliners Jasirah from Poland and Mohammed Ghareb from Egypt/Japan. We were still growing and had our biggest year yet with this final festival, and we were sad to get priced out of our venue, but excited to end on the highest of notes!
2. What advice do you have for advertising?
Advertising for an event is somewhat tricky. You have to think of who your target audience is and go from there. I spent a lot of time trying to engage with the general public for my events and in the end was never able to reach them or get them excited the way I had hoped.
Word of mouth was our best friend for engaging dancers in the greater community. Ensuring that everybody has a fantastic experience was a great way to get our community talking about Hot Raqs! Our artists and attendees trusted us as we built our brand.
Social media presence was also a very useful tool. Posting is great, but you have to invest a little bit in actual ads to reach people not already in your inner circle.
3. Did you experience issues with booking, attendance or drama in general? How did you handle it?
There are so many aspects to producing an event that people don’t think about. One of them is booking talent. I was lucky enough to have a lot of friends and acquaintances that are very talented. I leaned on those relationships for the first several years of Hot Raqs and knew that I could have a relatively painless experience with the talent. After that, I relied heavily on my intuition and the firsthand experience of others in the industry who have worked with people I did not already know. Other event organizers are generally open to talking about experiences with hiring talent (note to those of you that are touring artists or aspiring to do so… your professionalism and graciousness matter!).
In the case that no other organizers I knew hosted an artist I was interested in, I would reach out to that artist and schedule a zoom meeting. If the vibes were right, and my intuition was correct, we would talk about a contract.
I am happy to report that Hot Raqs was relatively drama free when it came to instructors, performers, and attendees. We had a fantastic support staff that was fabulous at any needed de-escalation. Plus I feel like I did a great job at contracting generous, talented, non-diva headliners.
However, there was one attendee from the general public that I invited to leave our festival: Since our event occurred in June and I am an ally to the LGBTQA+ community we also celebrate the folks within that community. There was an elderly woman from our local community who has had some experience with belly dance, and playing some auxiliary percussion with Armenian musicians who came up to me to tell me that she enjoyed the festival but did not care for the fact that we were celebrating the gay pride aspect at a public event. I told her it was not a ‘public event’, but rather it was MY event and she was welcome to leave and not return.
It was a disappointing moment, but luckily, the only one in memory.
4. How did you meet your goals?
Our goals were met with sheer determination to realize the vision and concept, a wonderful supportive group of dedicated friends and community members (you must have the support of locals! Whether it be friends and family or members of your local community), and loving optimism.
Spreadsheets are also a must. Keeping track of vendors, venue communications, performers, competitors, instructors, workshop, attendees, festival, and show tickets, gala performers, VIPs, volunteers, raffles, etc. is very hard to do without documenting progress and communication.
5. What would you like to see for events in the future?
I would like to continue to see events that elevate this art form we love so much. There are many fabulous organizers out there trailblazing and setting a high standard. Inclusivity, live music, support of artists indigenous to the cultures from which we are learning… all great things worth supporting!
6. How did you mitigate the cost?
This is a tough question because in the end, the reason we decided to discontinue the festival was because of increasing costs.
Budgeting and spreadsheets are your friend. Pay attention to what your costs truly are and price check things out before purchasing.
Also, I recommend utilizing any connections to resources you may have. Do you have a friend who is a fantastic genius at putting finger foods together for a reception? I sure did and she saved me thousands over the years in what it would have cost to hire a caterer to do.
I would like to add, it is important for all of us as a community to support these events that we enjoy and believe in. Producing a top-notch event is expensive and full of large necessary costs like nice venues, live music, and sound and light packages, plus fees for the headliners, including airfare, hotel, and compensation. As consumers, we should expect to have to pay for these amenities and commit to participating fully. I will never quite understand the concept of showing up to perform and then leaving without participating in workshops, shopping, buying show tickets.
7. Finally, what are you planning for yourself coming up?
The ending of our festival coincided with the university creating space for me as the executive Director of Warnors center for the performing arts in Fresno, California. It is a registered historic theater built in 1928 And is currently a 501(c)3 nonprofit encompassing several venues besides the theater and retail spaces.
I am currently working on securing grant funding for an ethnic show in this gorgeous theater. Ideally we can put on an event showcasing Egyptian dance from folkloric to raqs sharqi, featuring and supporting Egyptian artists.
Hot Raqs festival may be done, but Hot Raqs productions continues on!
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