Traditional Style Reception:

   Cocktails: If you are having a cocktail hour, you must have some background music to set the elegant mood for the evening. We do recommend that you choose the same style of music which you intend for your meal. If your cocktail hour is in a separate location from the reception, it is very simple for us to set up a small satellite system to cover this most important time for the evening's tone.

   Grand Entrance: If it is your desire to make a grand entrance, there is no better time to do so than at the end of the cocktail hour. Whether you choose to introduce the parents, grandparents and bridal party is up to you, but the bride and groom must be announced before you take the floor for your first dance. (Note: We announce most Brides and Grooms to the first 10 seconds of their first dance. This is always elegant and smooth-flowing.)

   First dance: This song should be chosen because it means something to the two of you. If you choose so, you'll be alone on the dance floor for somewhere between 30 seconds & one minute (for the photographer and videographer's benefit) before either the wedding party or all your guests are invited to join you.

   Toasts/Speeches: Following the first dance can be the perfect time for the Father of the Bride to make a brief speech/toast followed by the other toasts (Note: it is thoughtful to schedule toasts here at this early point in the evening if those who will be speaking are prone to being nervous about it--that way it is over early and they can enjoy the evening).

   Meal: We have found two options for background music to be our most popular. Most popular is a mix of Jazz/Crooners/Brazilian music (65% of clients), others choose a mix of Crooners and/or Rat Pack Vocalitsts (20%), a few choose a mix of the most popular Love Songs from all eras (10%) and another select group (5%), have something else entirely different in mind.

   Jazz/Brazilian music samples

   Father/Daughter and/or Mother/Son dances: In addition to the mp3 linked below, some other perennial favorites for these are: F/D: My Girl, In my daughter's eyes, You are the Sunshine of My Life, Isn't she lovely, Because you loved me; M/S: You're nobody 'til somebody loves you, You raise me up, Over the Rainbow-Israel K, I hope you dance. (Note: if you are not planning on inviting guests to join you during these, we recommend doing them between your salad and main course of the meal. If you choose this option then we recommend moving the Toasts to the end of the meal which makes an excellent transition from meal to dancing.)

   Possible Father/Daughter & Mother/Son dances.

   Dance set: Some tips regarding Wedding dance music: At a wedding we must attempt to touch on styles of music which will make each one of the guests get up and dance to at least one song during the course of the evening, despite the very broad age-range in attendance. We also have to keep in mind the fact that most of the older guests will leave after the cake has been served. This is accomplished by a chronological plan of attack. Once it is time to dance we begin with the oldest desired style of music and then progress chronologically through the rest of the evening until near the end of the event we are covering the most recent hits desired by the Bride and Groom. Our Top 40 collection is always up-to-date based on the latest Billboard charts.

   Motown samples. Disco samples. 80's samples

   Other Music Styles: There are many other styles of music for which we have very balanced and up-to-date playlists. So whether you and your guests want some Country, Indian, any of the many Latin styles, or whatever, we will be able to accomodate--you need only let us know exactly what you want.

   Cake Cutting and Garter & Bouquet ceremonies are an option that would follow the cake cutting. (Note: If you are not a fan of the traditional bouquet ceremony, you may like this twist--have all the couples in attendance take the floor for a slow dance. We then begin to request that those who have been married for X years or less be seated [usually in 5 year increments] until we have the couple who has been married the longest left on the floor. The Bride then presents the wife with the Bouquet and there is a brief photo-moment of the newlyweds and the oldest-weds. This is called the Anniversary dance).

   Final dance set which is usually comprised of more recent hits (within the last two decades). We can place the focus of this final set on any musical era of your choosing, however, typically this is the time to try to please the majority of your younger guests.

   Last Dance. Possible Last Dances

   Of course, if you have special needs for anything not mentioned in this plan (i.e. Apron dance, money dance, polkas, horas, other styles of music from around the world, other special announcements) or would like a different order of events, we are happy to accommodate you.

Mansion Location Wedding:

   Many of the mansions in the region are gorgeous solutions for wedding & reception needs. Most require a different approach for a smooth-flowing event. Typically these locations have a room for the DJ and dancing yet the guests have their meal in a different room or rooms, or outside on a deck, etc... The simple solution for these situations is to bring all guests into the main room where the DJ must be located and to complete most of your events there immediately following the cocktail hour. Here is how this would unfold:

• Cocktails (one hour)
  
• Invite guests to main room
  
• Grand Entrance
  
• 1st Dance
  
• F/D & M/S dances
  
• Toasts
  
• Meal
  
• Dancing
  
• Cake Cutting
  
• Dancing
  
• Last Dance
  

   This schedule allows us to be much less interruptive of you and your guests, requiring everyone's undivided attention at only one time and in one location during the evening.

Mansion Location #2: (a client favorite):

   A minor twist to the order outlined previously which is also our favorite since it works so well utilizes the same schedule up through the beginning of the meal but at meal time instead of a plated, sit-down meal, the food is served cocktail style from buffet stations. No specific room at the venue has tables at which guests must sit to eat. This frees your guests to socialize with whomever they wish, be in whichever room they wish, and dance whenever the mood strikes.

   For those of you under contract, here are our Planner Scripts, tips for success & Layout examples:

   Important Tip #1: Once under contract, your planner script will be due no later than six weeks prior to the event. It is then turned into a one-page order-of-events first draft, which is sent to you--complete with questions/issues/suggestions highlighted, in pdf format. This goes back and forth until we have our final version which I then email to your pertinent servicing vendors after I have called them (caterer, venue, etc.) early in the week of your event. That way we are all working off the same page, eliminating territorialism which would have interfered with your ability to enjoy your big day.

   Important Tip #2: For those of you who have hired the services of a full-service Professional Wedding Coordinator, please download accordingly but leave the grid area blank, completing everything else.

   Important Tip #3: Although we do encourage all clients to pick a large portion of the music for their event, we regret to inform you that if you pick all of the music for your entire evening, we cannot guarantee that your guests will dance. Picking all of your music prevents us from going with the flow of what is working on the dance floor, effectively limiting us in our own field of expertise. A simple solution is to provide us with a list of too much music for your evening which allows us to pick and choose as necessary to keep the party going.

   Success Tip #4: If you have an excellent handle on the bulk of your guest's favorite dance music styles then go ahead and pick more music than your contracted number of hours, if not, be more general when filling out your script after downloading it from the links below. In other words, just give us the styles of music and/or individual songs you absolutely do not want to hear. We will then construct your playlist of the most danceable and popular songs from the styles you do want.

   Final Tip: Just a reminder: a 4-hour reception will take approximately 65 songs from start to finish with musical silence only for toasts and blessing. 5-hour receptions take approximately 80 songs. Please keep in mind the duration of your cocktail hour and meal time which must always be more a more mellow style of background music.



   Preferred DJ positioning: (if your reception layout does not match one of these four jpg's, a simple rule of thumb is to ensure that there are no tables between the DJ's location and the dance floor--blocking the DJ's view of his workspace. Occasionally further discussion is necessary.)

Example #1, Example #2, Example #3, Example #4.



   For Wedding Ceremonies and Receptions:

Wedding Reception Full Service

Wedding Reception Zero Coordination

Here is a sample of how this multi-page document looks after conversion: Order of Events Sample



   For All Other Events:

Non-Wedding Events Microsoft Word .DOC version