How to book your wedding band

20 Dec How to book your wedding band

I can literally see on people’s faces how stressful it can sometimes be for couples to organise their wedding. Im sure it happens often. Usually the stress comes from trying to attend to all of the different facets of a wedding all at once.
Not only are wedding couples looking for the right band, but they’re also talking to several Melbourne wedding reception venues.
They’re getting in touch with celebrants, caterers, videographers, photographers , florists and so on. Wow!

Finding the perfect wedding band for you needn’t be stressful if you know what youre looking for!
I find that on a basic level, people are just looking for bands and musicians that reflect their own tastes and intuitions.
Personally I’ve seen many times that once my band “The Big Bang” showcases for couples, their minds are put at ease within 10 seconds just by the confidence of the band and the manner in which we play and relate.

Its interesting to see how musicians judge other musos vs how a wedding couple judges a band.
As a musician , one of the first things I tend to look for is band chemistry.
Assuming all the musical skills are in place, band chemistry is a powerful thing.
Its the element which says “yep, were doing this together as a band and were going to make this night special for everyone”.
Chemistry is the element that connects music to an audience.

More specifically for a wedding band, you want to look at booking musicians that have a wide variety of influences,
that can cover a lot of different styles of music over the night. This is SUPER IMPORTANT!
You’re going to have a different style of music at the start of your wedding reception than you are going to have at the end of it.
At the start of the night guests will be settling in and mingling with friends, relaxing amongst themselves.
Couples should look for musicians that can cover jazz, instrumentals, or chilled versions of current top 40 tunes.
By the middle of the night , its the dance , pop and classic rock that always win the audience over.
So its important to know a wide variety of songs, to play the best of soul, funk , rock , r’n’b and pop .

Having a male and a female singer together in the one wedding band is something I highly recommend.
One reason is that it just widens the whole songlist on the night so that you can choose songs from your favourite male and female artists.
The second reason is that most people love vocal harmonies, it does make a song sound so much more sweeter.
And thirdly, it takes the “vocal load” off one person singing for the whole night.

Band size is another factor for wedding couples.
Sometimes this will be dictated by budget and other times it will be dictated by the size of your wedding venue.
For smaller sized receptions, the very minimum band size I recommend would be The Big Bang 3 piece .
The most optimal band size (if I could choose it) would be The Big Bang 6 piece. I feel theres no limitations in what style you can do with
a 6 piece of male vocalist/guitarist , female vocalist, drums, bass, keyboards and saxophone.
Its the most effective line up in my experience that can cover all musical styles.

Budget – its always in the back of couples minds.
I encourage you to ask questions and find out how different bands operate.
With a bit of homework you’ll see that a lot of the Melbourne wedding bands that work as a franchise tend to charge excessively for overheads . For instance I know that not only are clients paying for the musicians on the night
but on top of that they are actually paying a high commision to their “consultants” (or any other fancy term that basically means “agent”),
and then on top of all that, clients also paying for expensive google advertising.
In some instances you’d be shocked to learn the breakdown of the actual fees with some of these “franchise” bands.
When you go with a wedding and events band like the Big Bang, the fee actually goes directly to the musicians involved with your night, with less overheads!

Looking forward to playing at your special event! Feel free to call on 0409 862 308 or email me at danmel@optusnet.com.au to discuss your wedding options .
Kind regards,
Dan Melita