Should You Let A Friend DJ At Your Wedding?
I had an email this morning from someone who had been considering booking me, but a friend had offered to DJ at their wedding instead. Fair enough. It's personal, it potentially saves a decent chunk of money and, assuming your friend is a good DJ, it probably sounds like a fairly obvious solution. I sent a reply wishing them well but also offering a little advice, because I've seen this play out a few times over the years and there's something slightly odd about wedding DJing that isn't immediately obvious: being a really good DJ doesn't necessarily make you a really good wedding DJ.
I say that as someone who came into weddings from clubs and festivals myself. The basic skills obviously travel — mixing, music knowledge, understanding energy, knowing when a record is working — but a wedding asks quite a lot more of you. You're playing to an unusually diverse group of people, most of whom didn't come because of the music and may have almost nothing musically in common. You're also responsible for a very long stretch of the evening. It's one thing to play a brilliant two-hour club set to people who already like the sort of music you play; it's quite another to take a room containing a 22-year-old bridesmaid, someone's dad, three children, a table of university friends and an aunt who has been waiting patiently for Motown since dinner, and somehow persuade them that they're all at the same party.
The bit I've seen catch friend-DJs out isn't usually the beginning. In fact, the beginning can go brilliantly. They're excited, they're playing music they love, their friends are dancing and everything feels easy. The test comes later, when the obvious choices stop working and the dancefloor starts thinning out. That's the point where experience becomes incredibly useful, because you need to work out why it's happening and what to do about it. Do you change genre? Drop the energy? Raise it? Go more familiar? Try something completely unexpected? Is everyone actually just at the bar because somebody has bought tequila? There isn't a manual for this stuff. After hundreds of weddings you simply have a much bigger box of ideas to rummage through. I've seen friend-DJs reach this point, run out of answers and, quite understandably, decide they'd rather get a drink and enjoy their friend's wedding. A playlist goes on, nobody is really in charge anymore and the party gradually loses its way.
And actually, that last bit is perhaps the better reason not to ask them. They're your friend. Presumably you've invited them because you'd quite like them to be at your wedding, rather than spending most of it behind a pair of decks worrying about whether your uncle is going to request Sweet Caroline for the fourth time. DJing a wedding properly is work. You're watching the room constantly, thinking several songs ahead, dealing with requests, keeping an eye on timings and trying to make the whole thing look as though you're doing almost nothing. If your friend regularly DJs weddings or private events then none of this applies; they may be absolutely perfect. But being great at rocking house parties, bars or clubs doesn't automatically prepare someone for the peculiar little ecosystem of a wedding.
There is, however, a solution I've always liked: give them a guest set. I've done this loads of times and it can be brilliant. Your friend brings some music, takes over for an hour or whatever feels right, gets the genuinely personal experience of DJing at your wedding and then, when they're finished, rejoins everyone on the dancefloor. Meanwhile there's still somebody there whose only job that evening is to make sure the party works. It costs more than having your mate do the whole thing, obviously, but you get the best part of having a friend DJ without quietly turning one of your wedding guests into an unpaid member of staff.
Related Articles:
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Spotify Is Brilliant. It Just Isn't A Wedding DJ.
The Little Things You Probably Won't Notice About Your Wedding DJ.
