How to Rock Your Own Party Using a Streaming Platform
Honestly, I have mixed feelings about writing this post. I feel a bit like I am betraying my own profession!
The fact is, I have written at length about why hiring a DJ is the great decision for your wedding, but it’s true that there are some situations where it’s simply not feasible for your specific event. Maybe you are on an extremely tight budget, or your reception won’t be long enough to justify the expense.
Whatever the reason might be, using a streaming platform like Spotify is a viable option. However, if you want your wedding music to go smoothly, it’s vital that you do some preparation.
Hiring a professional, experienced DJ will always be the best and least stressful option to create an exciting, memorable, but you can create your own good time by following the tips in this blog post.
Let’s get into it:
#1 - Put someone you REALLY TRUST in charge, so that you don’t have to deal with the particulars of managing the music and sound system on the day of your event.
Give them clear expectations on what you want during the ceremony (if applicable) speeches, dinner, and dancing.
Give them a copy of your itinerary, and a list of must play songs.
NOTE: When it comes to the dancing portion of the night, bear in mind that a DJ’s job is to accommodate EVERYONE’s musical taste to some extent, so make sure you pick someone fair, who won’t impose their own taste on everyone else. A very large part of DJing is balancing out all the different requests that we receive and making sure that everyone hears at least one of their requests if applicable.
#2 - Test your equipment ahead of time. I can’t stress this enough. Make sure that whoever is running the music really knows the equipment you are using, and has a backup in case something goes wrong so you don’t have dead air, or worse, the sound quits in the middle of the ceremony or speeches.
#3 - Get guest requests ahead of time. This is especially important if you will be in a remote area with little signal - if you know what people want to hear ahead of time, then you can download those songs to make sure they will have a chance to hear them during the wedding party. When I am preparing for a wedding reception, I also use these requests to extrapolate what other kind of music the guests might enjoy hearing so that the dance playlist is full of songs that people actually want to hear.
#4 - Have fun with your dinner playlist. Make your own dinner playlist out of low key, slower music that is special to you, or download a premade playlist made by another user. You can also have the best of both worlds by adding your favourite music to a pre-existing playlist. I love how specific some of the dinner playlists can be!
#5 - Build your Dance/party playlist based on the guest requests you have previously received from your guests. Unlike your dinner music, I don’t recommend simply playing one of those “wedding party” playlists from Spotify. Every single group of wedding guests has a very specific constellation of musical tastes and it’s unlikely a premade playlist will match that exactly.
#6 - Play your music in sets. When I am playing music for the dance portion of a wedding, I arrange the music into groups of 3-4 similar songs, as in, 80s pop, classic rock, 2010s EDM, etc.
Depending on if the people are responding really well to a certain genre or BPM (beats per minute), I will play more or less of that style of music.
If you are just going to “set and forget” your party music, it’s safe to create sets of a couple songs before changing genre.
Arranging your music in sets gives the people who enjoy a certain genre the chance to dance for a decent portion of time before switching it up to a different genre.
#7 Change it up - this is a no brainer, but make sure you have lots of different kinds of music on your playlist
Now that we’ve talked about positive tips, let’s consider what NOT to do:
#1 - Do NOT put the party playlist on shuffle. This will defeat the whole point of building the party’s energy using “sets” of music.
#2 - Do not overly discriminate against music you dislike. Listen, I get that you might hate some of the cheesy standards that get played at a lot of weddings. I understand and there are a lot of popular wedding standards that I dislike, even though they get requested all the time at weddings I play at.
Here’s the thing: when you are in the moment, experiencing your actual wedding, I 99% guarantee that you will feel differently than when you are sitting at home planning your music. For example, you might loathe the macarena and not want it played during your party, but when you are caught up in the excitement and fun of your wedding reception, you won’t mind playing it!
Of course, your mileage may vary and I’m not saying to pack your playlist with music you hate - just to keep an open mind. After all, you likely won’t be on the dancefloor the entire night - most newlyweds circulate around the whole venue all night.
In Conclusion
If this seems like a lot, that’s because it is. I have been doing this for years and I still find it a challenge to make sure that everyone is having an amazing experience.
I spend hours preparing for each wedding, and on the night of the actual wedding, all my focus is on keeping the guests’ energy up while also prioritizing the requests and preferences of the newlyweds.
Because it is so much work, I always recommend hiring a professional. If that simply is impossible, I hope that you have found these Spotify wedding tips useful!