Music to My Ears

Music to My Ears

July 27th, 2010 @ 3:47 pm by Mrs. Husky
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Every guide for the budget bride suggests listing the aspects of your wedding day that are most important, and working through the budget based on what is most important to you and your fiance. Mr. Husky’s and mine went sort of like this:

Get Married. Obviously.
No guest list cuts. We are both very community-oriented folks, and our large family and network of friends are very important to us. We refuse to exclude anyone from our wedding due to the CPP (cost per plate).
Good photographer. While we expect to enjoy vivid memories of our wedding day for many years to come, we hope to be married for many more years after that. When the images begin to fade from our minds, we want to have quality photos to remind us.
Live Music. I will confess to feeling a bit indulgent with this one. And I have no legitimate excuse to make it feel less extravagant. But so much of the Husky relationship has involved live music – be it the outdoor festival we attend every summer in the south, or the many concert tickets to which we’ve treated one another. Here we are at one particularly rainy festival:

Music to My Ears : wedding denver music 111 11

(personal photo)

So we set about our search for a band. This part was harder than I expected. It seemed they all wanted an exorbitant amount of money for an elevator music sound. We saw a few of the bands perform, and always left disappointed. Right around this time, we also found out Mr. Husky’s contract was expiring, and we considered scratching the live music from our list of Most Importants.

Of course, there are pros and cons to both a band and a deejay. Deejays can play any song you want to hear, while bands are limited to what they know how to perform. Bands can set the tone for the evening with the style of music, while a deejay’s set can be erratic. Bands need to take set breaks, while the deejay can just set several songs in motion while he heads to the bar. But a live band can inspire more enthusiasm and dancing. Hiring a DJ didn’t seem to offer much in saving, and we strongly considered using the iPod. We decided to put off the decision until we returned from a vacation to New Orleans.

The sounds that fill that city made my desire for a live band that much stronger. So, I changed my search a little bit and ended up finding a fantastic band at an incredibly reasonable price, which I will go into more detail about later.

How did you decide whether to use a deejay, band or iPod? What other upsides/downsides are there for deejays vs. live bands?

Tags: denver, music |

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10 Responses to “Music to My Ears”

Bee

Miss Sand Dollar (message) 1,305 posts, Bumble bee

Band PLUS ipod! We’re hooking up the ipod to the band’s equipment for set breaks and eating time. Maybe you could work this out with your band so there’s never a gap in music?

7/27/10 @ 4:06 pm (reply)

Member

shaydenise (message) 1,151 posts, Bumble bee

Bands in the area were too expensive, though I wish we could have had one (as a musician myself it would have been nice). We considered an ipod but in all reality we have over 200 guests and an ipod just isn’t realistic for that many guests. So we found a fabulous DJ that has been in the business for about 15 years but is trying to break into our area so we got an amazing deal!

7/27/10 @ 4:13 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Socks (message) 1,323 posts, Bumble bee

A band can bring so much energy to a wedding, which I love, but our venue has an on-staff dj that we got at a discount, so I wasn’t gonna say no to that!

7/27/10 @ 4:29 pm (reply)

Bee

Mrs. Hamster (message) 4,046 posts, Honey bee

We went with a live band - at first I was a bit worried about whether they would have the range to perform a diverse set; however, we were very happy with them and many of our guests said it was the best music at a wedding they had heard!

7/27/10 @ 4:32 pm (reply)

Member

mareundarum (message) 83 posts, Worker bee

My brother and SIL had a band at their wedding and it was awesome. They played some newer stuff, but a lot of the older, classic party favorites (cheesy stuff like The Twist, romantic stuff like Sinatra, etc). They played recorded music during the breaks, which were honestly few and far between. When it came time to plan my wedding, I was worried about the cost of a band, and worried about the flexibility, never mind about the perceived lack of talent in this area! My mom fought hard for a band, I fought for a DJ, my wedding planner had a group that provided both! So for a bit more than just a DJ, we’ll be having both at my wedding in November. Oh, and the band is also providing a soloist musician for the cocktail hour (nominal fee, of course). I say if music is important to you, try to find the pennies to get it. It’s worth the important stuff, and just so you don’t think I’m crazy, I’m unemployed at the moment too!

7/27/10 @ 8:28 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Glasses (message) 2,741 posts, Sugar bee

Pretty simple, we couldn’t afford anything else but an iPod. Ahhhh, the joys of being a budget bride.

7/27/10 @ 8:46 pm (reply)

Member

Knubbsy-Wubbsy (message) 2,395 posts, Buzzing bee

Live Band- ours is reasonably priced and after several years of the month organization-level dances being DJed I want OUR dance to be far better (but we’re also having one of the best swing DJs in the metroplex for the breaks- he’s not a bad dancer either)

7/27/10 @ 9:26 pm (reply)

Member

Farfromachildbride (message) 1,006 posts, Bumble bee

Live band, hands down. The most awesome receptions I can remember attending each had one. We had one and they were awesome! Our guests danced from the first stong to the last. We had an ipod set with some of our favorite songs that the band couldn’t play and those songs were heard then during the band’s breaks. Live music is definitely worth the expense. I would go cheap on the food and cake and even make it a cash bar in order to get the band. As a guest, I would prefer to eat cheap food and cake in order to hear and dance to a band!!

7/28/10 @ 8:02 am (reply)

Member

futurediplomatswife (message) 524 posts, Busy bee

We were going to do the iPod thing until we realized just how much work would go into it. And in our search for a DJ instead, we found one whose many rave reviews included the praise that he’s very good at reading your crowd, and if he plays something that causes people to leave the dance floor, he’ll cut it short and fade into a different song. The iPod DJ certainly can’t do THAT! And a dance party is really important to us, so we decided to nix the DIY idea and go DJ.

We are, however, having live musicians for the ceremony. We liked that compromise between band and DJ.

7/28/10 @ 3:46 pm (reply)

10.