“How do I choose the perfect live band for my wedding?”
How do I know which band is right for me?
Without doubt, these are the two most common questions about hiring live bands for weddings that we get asked at AffordaBand. And as our all-important wedding day is one of the biggest days of our lives, it’s essential to get professional advice for selecting the perfect live band for your wedding, and to then act on it accordingly.
Certainly, the most important ingredient by far in creating a fabulous wedding reception party that you and your guests will always remember, is the selecting of superb live musicians for your wedding. It will almost certainly always be found via an established live music agency. Hiring a professional live cover band will absolutely make ALL the difference to the success of your evening’s reception party, so here’s our expert advice on how to choose a band that your guests will rave about for years to come!
When attempting to hire a live band, firstly, make sure you’re able to distinguish between a premium, world-class professional live act, and a somewhat regular band who potentially plays mostly just around the local clubs and pubs.
The pub band will probably promise you a lot, and may offer you a somewhat competitive rate, just to secure the booking for your wedding gig, as they’re desperate to get a premium performance booked in to their diary.
But the very likely possibility that they will be of much lesser quality, somewhat inexperienced with a stylized wedding audience, and perhaps too loud also, is too much of a risk for such a special day – certainly too risky to thrust it upon your incredibly-valued family and friends who are looking forward to a magical evening of entertainment. After all, this is your big opportunity to enjoy your evening with all the people who mean so much to you, and they’ll presume they’re going to be in for a wonderful night, so best to make an educated decision on your live music band!
Essentially, the premium wedding band will have quality live music agency representation, who will monitor the pro band’s performances each time they play through customer feedback replies and general correspondence after the event, so the management company knows the band is adhering to the standard expected. Inversely, the pub band usually doesn’t have any independent management keeping them in check, so they needn’t necessarily subscribe to any standards expected by good management.
It’s therefore possible that unprofessional standards or scenarios could occur. They might sometimes underdress for a wedding gig, and just turn up in jeans and t-shirts, possibly be intoxicated as well, or worse – they might not turn up at all if a better offer comes along – what a disaster this would be. But these scenarios happen often when people do decide to go with an unproven pub band that isn’t substantiated by an independent live music booking agent who knows and can confirm that they’re a reliable asset.
Essentially, with no agency representation, the questionable pub band has nothing to lose, so they’ll do anything to get the gig, whereas the premium-quality professional wedding band relies solely on gigging permanently for their living via their booking agent, so they will arrive to impress, very well presented, promptly, and always perform to a brilliant professional standard – their reputation means the world to them and at such an important event, they’ll always apply themselves accordingly.
With the premium live band having professional agency management, if the premium band for some odd reason didn’t perform to a high standard, they would likely be dropped from the band roster by their agency, never to work for them again. So the premium pro live band has A LOT invested in their careers, and so has a lot to lose.
The pub band however, with little or no management, has nothing to lose. And finally you, the wedding client, on your special wedding day – DO have a lot to lose! Never put at risk the one most treasured day in your young life by choosing a potentially unreliable pub band.
We can’t emphasize enough – take the memories forever of a wonderful wedding, engineered by a fantastic professional band with reliable agency management! Your agent should always be open and approachable for any queries you might have. A good band booking agent is there to act as the go-between for you, so that he can prepare all details, and the band shows up and adheres to those arrangements.
So to summarise, we cannot emphasize the point strongly enough:
ALWAYS choose a top level professional live band for your wedding, that has professional live music agency representation – they work together and in tandem to make sure all bases are covered for your wedding, so if anything does go wrong on the day (as they sometimes do!), the agency will strive to rectify any issues quickly, and keep your magical day flowing.
And one final, very important factor is to never deal directly with your band – ALWAYS ask the band’s booking agent to negotiate ALL performance factors on your behalf. This provides a professional mediator to expertly facilitate all details involved for all parties, so there are no areas of confusion or indecision, and ALWAYS produces a much better, secure result for you on your wedding day.
The majority of live music agencies today are eminently dependable, very professional and invested in your wedding’s success, and with a responsible entity overseeing the wedding, your expertly chosen live cover band will certainly turn an otherwise regular evening party into an incredibly memorable event, that you and your guests will cherish the memories from for decades to come!
So with all that said, to begin your search for the perfect band, just head over to our live bands page, peruse our band listings, and if you see one you like, just click through to their page to read all about them, and listen to their fabulous recordings.
AffordaBand UK are experts at providing great live bands for weddings. Call or email us today, so we can begin the process of helping you select the perfect live band for your wedding!
