You’ve spent your retirement fund and put a lien against your house to put together the most perfect wedding you can, only to have the reception flop and everyone leave early. Why did they leave? You hired the wrong band for your reception. There are major mistakes that some brides and grooms make when hiring a wedding band; make sure you don’t fall into these mistakes.

Hiring a Wedding Band

Don’t book a band that only plays your favorite style of music.

Many brides and grooms want to hire a band that plays their favorite genre of music, be it blues, rock, salsa or any other single genre. One genre of music is not enough variety to keep the night interesting for a four hour wedding reception which is usually how long the average reception lasts. The crowd is going to get really sick of just blues, salsa or any single genre by the time the fourth hour arrives if they are even still there. The perfect band for a wedding reception should have a variety of music that keeps the night fresh with a mix of old and new dance music as well as fast and slow tunes. The band should also have a nice mellow dinner set to play while everyone is eating and it should be at a low volume so guests can still converse comfortably while they are eating.

Make certain the band is not overbearingly loud.

Next, the band you hire should have either an electronic drum kit or have a very light hitting drummer. Electronic drums are very quiet and sound amazing at any volume level and a light hitting drummer won’t be overbearingly loud and can be easily mixed to sound good at any volume by the sound engineer. The reason this is important is that without either of these things the drummer will be extremely loud, and when that happens the rest of the band has to be extremely loud to be heard over the din of the drums and the entire band becomes so loud that your older guests will be exiting in droves with your younger guests leaving shortly after. When the band gets this loud, it is not possible to play a dinner set without being too loud for the guests to converse comfortably resulting in complaints from all guests constantly throughout dinner.

Do your homework and check the band’s credentials.

Lastly, check some references on the band you hire. Are they the band that got drunk and fell off the stage at their last wedding or were they a no show at the last reception? One way to find out just how reputable they are is to ask for their list of booked dates and see where they are booked. If they have lots of weddings on their calendar, they have most likely done a great job at their previous receptions and have gotten more receptions through word of mouth. If they have few bookings at all, beware! Unless they are a brand new band, they are probably not booked for a reason. You can also look for reviews online on wedding websites from brides that actually had them at their wedding reception. Above all, go and see them live in a wedding setting. Most hotel ballrooms are connected to foyers where you can view the band performing at a wedding reception without actually entering the reception and feeling like the wedding crashers.

So to recap, make sure the band you hire plays a good variety for all the different age groups present at your reception, can perform at a comfortable level without driving your guests away and is a reputable band that will show up on time and do a great job on the most important day of your life.

Hiring a Wedding Band

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Ron Johnson

Ron Johnson has performed in a wedding band based in Austin, Texas since 1991 and has performed at literally thousands of weddings over the last 22 years.