As regular readers know Live Music Management supply a variety of different styles of DJ and also walk around acts like stilt walkers and fire breathers. We also have a team of roller girls who skate around an event or venue adding excitement and entertainment to an evening and offering a great ability to promote the venue or a product.
Temple Walkabouts Retro Fever night has been a fantastic success since its launch earlier in the year and LMM have amped it up a gear with the addition of roller girls as an added attraction on the night. They have been a massive hit with the customers and DJ Mike Wedgewood took this video of the girls last Friday night when we had a visit from Captain Jack Sparrow!
This blog is in part a thank you to Mike who posts some really great video of the Temple Walkabout Fridays and always plays a great retro set on the evening.
To hire roller girls or a retro DJ please contact Live Music Management on 08454 900515.
If you are looking to hire a wedding singer you may be haunted by the vision of the sweet but hapless character that Adam Sandler plays in the movie of the same name but here at Live Music Management we have quality wedding singers for hire who can offer a low cost alternative to hiring a live band.
A wedding singer is a musician who either plays an instrument or works to backing tracks (or sometimes both) and performs popular covers at weddings and parties. Admittedly it is a field which is full of naff , karaoke style acts that are more suited to a wet Wednesday at your local Dog And Duck than performing at a classy wedding however LMM have sorted the wheat from the chaff and are able to offer you some of the best solo and duo wedding singers in the UK.
The advantages of booking a wedding singer instead of a full band are obvious (the cost of hiring one musician as opposed to several is going to offer you a saving) but there are also other reasons why clients sometimes choose a solo act over a band.
1.If there is limited space then obviously a solo singer will take up less space than a five piece band.
2.If there is a limited window for the entertainment to get set up in.It ussually takes less time for a solo wedding singer to get set than a full band (believe me I have played with many drummers and most are going to take thirty minutes to set up a drum kit!!!)
3.If there is a sensative sound limiter in the venue it is ussually easier to control the volume on a one man band than on a full band with drums.
You can check out our range of acoustic and power solo/duo wedding singers here http://www.lmmuk.com/solos-duos.php or you can call the LMM office for best options.
A little late in being posted but having had a few days back with the office fully opened we can now reflect on the bewildering amount of different types of events Live Music Management bands and DJs were involved in over the Bank Holiday weekend.
Our High Street clients reported pretty brisk business and we had hundreds of party DJs playing in venues like The Walkabout Bars, Bar Risa , Wahoo , Tom Peppers and Pitcher and Piano. Our show host DJs were busy at work in the Highlight venues with great comedy shows on offer. Live music also featured in the High Street with great party bands playing in the Walkabout venues and The Junction in Oxford plus power duos over in Covent Garden Walkabout and Cardiff. Over at Watford Walkabout Sunday saw a fantastic turn out for our DJs with a special guest appearance from The Artful Dodger himself.
We had a high number of weddings over the weekend at which our wedding bands and DJs did their very best to make the brides and grooms forget the miserable weather and enjoy the party.
Dozens of bands were playing in holiday parks around the UK from Scotland down to Cornwall (and speaking of Cornwall party rock band Brainscape stormed it at Newquay Walkabout for the start of the Summer season.)
There was also the Camden Crawl where Live Music Management sound techs and DJs worked the Dingwalls venue which is the epicentre of this great event.
Finally we had a couple of bands working overseas on the bank holiday weekend.
All in all a varied weekend for live music management and our splendid roster of live acts.
With the advent of civil and non traditional wedding ceremonies there has been an upsurge in more unusual uses of music during the wedding service. Many couples over the last decade or so have decided to side line the use of the traditional church organist / choir combination and search for music which perhaps has personal meaning for them as people or will project a less formal atmosphere.
Some couples choose to use both the traditional church elements and other pieces in order to put together a “modern” service. LMM went to a beautiful wedding last year where the church organist played Elbows “On A Day Like This” followed by hymns song by the choir and where one of the centre pieces of the service was an acoustic duo playing a Van Morrison song.
At Live Music Management we have hundreds of musicians in the classical music , jazz or pop fields who are able to put together something special for your wedding service. We are used to providing bespoke solutions for weddings and we have in the past put together many memorable moments including recreating the scene from Love Actually where a “pop up” choir perform “All You Need Is Love” through to having a classical guitarist perform rock songs in a classical style and a harp player playing pop songs whilst the bride enters the church.
If you are looking to book some different music for your wedding ceremony then please call our team to discuss the options available for you or if you have a distinct idea then we will be able help put it together for you.
One of the things we look forward to on a Monday morning (or in this case on a Tuesday morning after the May Bank Holiday) is the feedback from the weekends shows.
We have a variety of ways of retrieving feedback.
Our regular clients like Walkabout and Bar Risa are obliged to fill in a feedback form at site level which gives us the SP on the weekend in quite a bit of detail. Specific questions asked include
“Were the acts on time?”
“Did the acts perform to the standards that we expect?”
“How did the audience react?”
With regards to private clients we ask everyone of them to review both our services and the acts performance. We do not doctor these. Indeed we offer links to review sites that we have no control of. We figure that we are confident that the good will far out weigh the bad and in over twelve years of trading this has always been the case.
Here is an email that came in today with a review for a wedding band.
“We’ve just posted a review online so hopefully you should have that through. We were absolutely thrilled with the band. Many thanks to you for sorting out the arrangements and please pass on our personal thanks to the band as well – we really couldn’t have been happier with their professionalism and energy on the night, everyone loved them.
We will certainly recommend both LMM and the Hi-Fidels to others.
Three LMM musicians are to recieve an Afghanistan Medal in recognition of their
support to the UK Armed Forces on behalf of CSE Forces Entertainment. We are,understandably, very proud of this achievement.
Paul Brown who currently drums with Brainscape and has also played drums for Electric Mayhem and One Night Standeoke Rockaoke Band will be recieving the honour along with Doll Hunt and Sam Wilcock from Electric Mayhem.
The medal is issued to people who have accumolated the qualifying number of days in theatre and will be awarded by one of the most senior member of HM Forces, the Chief of Defence Staff, General Sir David Richards at a special ceremony later this year.
Live Music Management are very proud of this achievement and would like to thank CSE for the opportunities afforded these bands and to the musicians themselves for the hard work and dedication which has led them to being awarded the medal.
I was reading an article in one of the wedding magazines yesterday suggesting that “I’ve Got A Feeling” by The Black Eyed Peas is the most played song at weddings. Although the science behind this announcement is probably a bit dubious (like many of these things it looks like the kind of thing a PR person has made up to generate a bit of extra copy) it sounds about right.
“Ive Got A Feeling” is an uplifting song. It immediately says “good times” and is one of those songs that starts a dancefloor and puts a smile on peoples faces. Function bands can play it with ease and it sits well with DJs acting as a bridging song (perhaps) between new chart and classic funky disco songs.
I know that very many wedding bands have this Black Eyed Peas song in their repertoire and it is one of those songs that it has almost become a cliche to start the set off with. (Fifteen years ago Robbie Williams “Let Me Entertain You” occupied this place ….so much so that at a showcase I once saw four bands in a row open their sets with it…shortly after this Peter Kay’s spoof working mens club power duo, Park Avenue, memorably played it on Phoenix Nights.)
Last year I was at a wedding where ‘Ive Got A Feeling” was played by the DJ and each section of the guests entered the dancefloor to perform a little pre planned dance. First the bride and groom, then the bridesmaids , then the best man and the ushers and finally the mums and dads,aunties and uncles. It was lovely actually and as much as these first dance spectaculars have become quite common they still have the power to shock and excite when you see them in the flesh.
So all in all the wedding magazine is probably right about thsi Black Eyed Peas song become the most played song at weddings. Is it a cliche to be avoided? Not yet..it still puts a smile on peoples face when it is played by a wedding band or DJ.
Live Music Management are very proud of our involvement in supplying many young farmers organisations throughout the UK with their function bands and DJs. In particular we are thrilled to be supplying the annual AGM with bands and DJs for the fifth year running.
Anyone travelling down to Torquay for the 2012 Young Farmers Annual General Meeting will be sure to have a fantastic time with a line up that is guaranteed to please.
This years line up includes Radio Ones Comedy Dave , Aled Hayd Jones and Dom who are all well known from their performances on the Breakfast Show with Chris Moyles. Besides this the line up also includes some tremendous party bands.
Two years ago I spent the weekend at the Torquay Event, the last time it was held in this town, and I thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere both inside the Riviera Conference Centre and out in town. Back in 2010 we were helped by the sunny weather which helped me understand why Torquay was given the nickname “The English Riviera.” It doesn’t look like the weather gods will be so good to us this year because as I write the forecast for the weekend is poor and the rain is pouring down. However I am sure this will not dampen the spirits of the 5,000 plus Young Farmers traveling down to the event.
Live Music Management wish them all the best for a great weekend and a successful event.
You can contact Live Music Management about booking entertainment for your corporate events by calling 08454 900515 or emailing info@lmmuk.com
When Live Music Management Head Honcho Tim held his fortieth birthday party the entertainment he chose was a great Latin Salsa Band. The party was held in the Cobden Club which is a gem of a venue in West 10 (just down from the LMM offices.) Friends,colleagues and family drank mojitas and caipirinhas and then danced the night away to the sound of the Sugar Kings who bring with them an authentic South American sound.
From what I remember it was a brilliant night!!!
Latin Salsa Bands can be a fantastic option for a wedding or a party. They bring with them the sunny sound of Latin America and produce music which is fun to dance to. Many people are familiar with the dancing to the music from Salsa dance nights and salsa excercise classes. Latin and Salsa music is instantly recognisable and infectious music which grooves in such a way that you can’t help but be swept along by the sounds and the beat.
For anyone planning some music for a wedding or party who wants to avoid pop music but at the same time wants to encourage dancing then Latin music is a must. At Live Music Management you can book one of the UKs top Salsa bands for your party. Details are available on our Latin page or by calling our office on 08454 900515.
Happy St Georges Day to all our friends and colleagues (and to my brother in law who shares a birthday with this date.)
St Patricks Day has become a huge excuse for everyone to claim some Irish ancestry and enjoy a night of guinness and Irish music and Australia Day is rapidly becoming a celebration throughout the UK as backpackers and Aussie ex pats spread the word about this day of celebration. St Georges Day is less widely celebrated. In the events calendar it falls short of July 4th in terms of its nationwide uptake as a party date.
This said we do have some events happening this evening for St Georges Day.
If you check out the listings of your local Walkabout bar many of them will be celebrating with a party DJ playing some great British anthems . We also have a private corporate event this evening with a St Georges Day theme. Our mobile DJ will be playing a celebration of all that is good in British music taking in The Beatles and The Stones and running right through to Tinie Tempah and Jessie J. There will also be a Britpop covers band on board to take the party home.
