Music to Marry To: Part 4

Now that I've shared all the music we planned to play at our wedding, it's time to get real here ya'll. Things did not go totally as planned, but hopefully you can learn from my mistakes!

First off ... the things that worked well.

• The last-minute decision to use two songs for the processional instead of just one. Once we were at our rehearsal and saw how long it would take to get all our family down the aisle, I was glad I had already set aside a second song. I still didn't want to walk in to my own song since our aisle was so short, so the bridesmaids walked in to the same song I did.
• The recessional to the "Throne Room" song from Star Wars. This was a BIG hit. Our guests got a laugh out of it and our bridal party spent the whole rehearsal practicing their Darth Vader and wookie impersonations in anticipation. It was awesome.
• Having a few group dances and songs people like to sing loudly to. Even if they seem cliché. They're cliché for a reason: everyone knows them!
• iTunes playlists in general. I loved putting them together, I loved the music we chose, and I loved having control over everything. Hee hee.

Things I would have done differently:

• When we decided to include communion in our ceremony, our pastor wanted it to be "all or nothing" — if we were going to include it, everyone would have the chance to receive it. I was not expecting very many people to participate due to some religious variances in our family, so I was flabbergasted when the bulk of our guests came forward to receive the sacrament. When "Your Love" ended, there was no other music to switch to simply because I hadn't anticipated that so many people would want to share with us. So "Your Love" played twice. I should have picked a second song just in case.
• When I was planning, I wanted our wedding to feel like a giant cocktail party. I absolutely accomplished that feel, but I think maybe it was silly of me to expect the social cocktail party to turn into a wild dance party just because dance music was playing. Don't get me wrong, people danced when they wanted to, and we still had a good time, but it never turned into the dance party I was expecting.

Now that part I know you're all curious about. Logistics.

• If you're going to DIY your music, get someone to help you. Get a friend or DOC to be in control, so that in the event of needing to stop the music, skip around or WHATEVER, you'll have someone to deal with it. While I noticed little issues with the music, there wasn't much I could do about it at any point in time. Our friendor DOC was invaluable.
• Sometimes important people leave wedding receptions early. Such is life. If it is important to you that these people experience an "event," you may wind up bumping it up a little earlier than planned. We ended up jumping around in the playlist a lot. We bumped up both the cake cutting and the tosses by about 30 minutes apiece. Some of the music didn't get played. That was okay. Even though our "event" music was scheduled into the rest of the playlist, it wasn't a problem since our DOC could click around in the playlist. 
• We did have a few instances in which we needed to pause the playlist and wait for people to gather on the dance floor, including for the tosses and the anniversary dance. No music is not the end of the world, but if that would bug you then maybe pad your events with extra songs.

And finally, because I know you want to know whether or not this was a massive train-wreck ... our self-emceeing.

• It didn't work. But not for the reasons ya'll predicted and warned me about! Honestly, I don't think anyone even noticed we had self-emceed, because we had some sound system issues at the reception. If the volume got too loud, the sound would just cut out. (We think we accidentally overloaded the generator? or something by plugging in the caterers' equipment in the sound booth since there was no kitchen space.) The music cut out several times, and at the beginning of the reception, you could barely hear the music, much less our emceeing. Our voices just weren't loud or persistent enough, so our DOC or family members stepped up to the mic whenever it was necessary.
• One of the things ya'll were concerned about was us missing the music cues. We had our DOC give us a heads up about 10 minutes before each "event." She also made suggestions mid-reception regarding the playlist skipping, so we had a pretty good idea of when things were coming up and could plan to be on the floor accordingly.

There you go! I hope this is helpful to ya'll, and if you have any other questions, leave a comment or PM me!

Did anything about your wedding surprise you?