Finding Wedding Entertainment on a Budget

Music schools can be a great resource for wedding musicians.

Finding entertainment for your wedding can be tricky if you are on a budget, but if you look outside the usual sources, you can find some hidden gems. Do you live near a music school? If so find out when they hold their yearly or end of term recital and attend this. Keep note of who you are interested in, and either speak to the manager of the school on the night or the morning after.

Try to resist the temptation to ask the student on the night itself, as they will probably be buzzing from the performance and may agree without thinking it through properly. You may think this is a good thing, but you want to make sure that you have someone who is 100% committed and didn’t just agree because there on adrenalin and want to look good amongst their peers.  Your best bet is to liaise with the student via their teacher

Are you getting the band that you paid for?

If you see a good band perform at your friend’s wedding and would like to book them, get it in writing that the musicians that you actually saw perform, will be the actual musicians present at your wedding. What can often happen if that whilst the lead vocalists will remain the same, the backing musicians can vary from one wedding to the next depending on availability and prior commitments.
Depending on the level of rehearsals and how well this different ensembles gel together, you may end up with a different sound than what you originally heard.

Do I Have to Feed The Band?

This is one of the questions that many couples planning a wedding are unsure about. Should you feed the band? Well firstly you must remember that a fed band is a happy band. Their energy levels will be up and you will basically get a better performance if they don’t have to deal with rumbling stomachs. You do not need to order the official wedding meal as if you have a band, photographer and videographer to feed that could end up costing hundreds of dollars just for their meals. However, you could ask the caterer if they could prepare some food for the vendors. Perhaps they could cater to the vendors after the guests have eaten, as there will likely be leftover food anyway that would just go to waste. This is especially true for buffet style catering as there is generally always more food ordered than will actually be consumed by guests.