tips
tips and tricks
Organising a Musical Evening for Your Parents on Their Anniversary!
March 19, 2013Unknown
A
special anniversary calls for a special evening – and if your parents like live
music, you’ve got the evening’s entertainment right there. As long as you know
the musicians, that is…
You
see, there’s no argument as to why you should organise a musical evening for
music-loving parents on their anniversary (though clearly there is some
conflict there if one or the other of them doesn’t actually like live
performance); the real question is, how do you do it? There’s a lot to think
about, from what kind of music you’re going to have to where you’re going to
hold it. The first and most importantpiece of advice, then, is give yourself
enough time to put it all together.
Finding a Venue
Your
venue needs a minimum of three attributes. It has to allow live music within
the times you want to play there. It needs to be able to accommodate the number
of people you expect to turn up. And it has to have somewhere people can go if
they don’t want to hear the bands.
The
last point is flexible to a degree, but it’s guaranteed to make for a more
successful show on everyone’s part. It doesn’t matter whether your musical
entertainment is an acousticguitarist playing the Goldberg Variations or a
full-on thrash metal behemoth: sometimes, people just want to talk. This is particularly
true at a wedding anniversary, where a good proportion of the guests may not
have seen each other for many years.
Finding Some Musicians
Next
job on the list is sorting out the evening’s musical programme. As a general
rule, an anniversary celebration is better served by multiple bands and/or
artists than just one – unless you’re making the musical part of the evening
quite short. This is partly because, as noted, there’ll be people there who
want to chat and catch up with each other. It also ensures, if you are going to
have a longer show, that there’s more likely to be something there catering to
every taste.
The
primary tastes you have to concern yourself with, of course, are your parents.
What do they like? Do they have a special song, or a band or piece of music
that means a lot to them? It’s their night, so the choice of music should
revolve around them.
It’s
likely you’ll be playing yourself, or will know people who do – this supposes
that there’s quite an active interest in music within your family, and that
this is the reason for arranging a show for the wedding anniversary. If this is
not the case, you need to find suitable musicians through adverts. Guitar shops
can be handy places to start looking, or music shops in general. Bear in mind
bands and acts tend to be local to the shop – so in a Colchester guitar shop,
for instance, you’ll find Essex based musicians.
Arrange Sound Check Times
A
musical evening requires a certain amount of on the day preparation. Sound
check is essential if the band or act are to sound appropriate for the space.
You should arrange with the venue to come in during the afternoon and check the
levels of all performers. Use a PA, a mixing desk and a sound engineer for all
acts with more than one instrument, and use the PA for single instrument acts.
You’ll
have noticed the operative words in that last paragraph. If you’re going to put
together a musical evening you need a PA. This may be supplied by your venue.
If not, you will need to hire one. You will need the mixer that goes with it –
and if you don’t have the skills yourself, a sound engineer to operate it.
And Finally…
Have
fun! It’ll be stressful at first, but your parent’s response will make it all
worth it…
