Thursday, March 20, 2008

A musical quandry for my friend, the interwebs

Hey Internet! I have a question for you. Let's pretend that you are the kind of person who likes to dance at weddings (which, by the way, I sincerely hope you are). As such a person, what sort of music would you hope to be dancing to at said weddings?

Would it be:

A. Motown, baby! Give me some Stevie Wonder and I am sign, sealing, and delivering the finest dance moves you have ever seen.

B. Disco. I am all ABBA, all the time.

C. The terrible hip hop of my youth. I know what to do, chief: bust a move.

D. The obscure hipster music of today. I will feel cheated if anyone besides me can name the bands.

E. Something else, which I will hereby explain for you in elaborate detail!


Thank you for your assistance in this matter.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

If it were me, I'd go for a mix of styles, if possible. It keeps things interesting. When I got married, we had a jazz quartet, but I'm a music nerd and the band leader was a friend of mine. Everybody danced, though -- in the photos of the reception, there are masses of empty chairs with everyone piled on the dance floor. It was kind of amazing. Part of the rationale for us, though, was that I really wanted my grandmother to have a good time. She had come a long way and I knew she'd be unhappy if there was a lot of raucous rock music, even if she wouldn't actually say anything.

Anonymous said...

i vote for a mix of styles, definitely. that should keep things fun and interesting!

Mohundros said...

You may have noticed that our DJ kind of sucked. Still, I learned a few things from him about wedding music.

First, there's a list of 20 or so songs that are proven winners at weddings. That's where you find your Electric Slide and Achy-Breaky Heart. We told him we didn't want most of the stuff on the list, but the point is that some songs or genres just get people ready to dance.

You have to know your audience. "Oldies" tend to engage your parents' generation, so they should be in the mix or they might not get out of their seat. Once they're there, the beat might keep 'em there. I wouldn't put hipster/the latest stuff in there unless it's something you personally like and believe will be somewhat timeless. I put in some Spoon, but not from the latest album. For example.

We had him play older stuff and some world music for background music, which I think worked well.

Our absolute no-nos were New Country and Smooth Jazz, and I think as long as you avoid that you should be OK.

Lass. said...

All of the above, please.

Librarian Girl said...

Dancing at weddings is one of my most favorite activities in the whole UNIVERSE.

I agree with everyone else, a mix of styles, and also what Stevem said about the hipster/indie stuff.

Motown? yes. Disco? yes. Old hip hop? yes. All yes!

librarianista said...

Thanks, all y'all! Very helpful.

myra-lee said...

I agree with the mix suggestion. Are you guys just using an iPod or do you have a live human involved? I have a dancetastic playlist I'm pretty proud of if you'd like to take a gander...