Fairmount Park Horticulture Center Wedding in Philadelphia, PA

East Coast Soul was grateful to be asked to join Alison & Ruben for their stunning Fairmount Park Horticulture Center Wedding in Philadelphia, PA.

Preprations for Alison & Ruben's Big Day

Our preparations for the wedding day began months in advance, with Alison & Ruben offering a myriad of musical and logistical options with us for the wedding day (we take our preparation process extremely seriously). Alison & Ruben were heavily involved in this advanced planning and incredibly helpful throughout.

Once the wedding day arrived, East Coast Soul traveled to Philadelphia, PA and began our standard load-in and sound check for Fairmount Park Horticulture Center weddings. Our process for loading in and setting up at any given venue is a big part of our preparation process. This is a part of the day that we take seriously, spending extra time to avoid rushing, and ensuring our gear is properly tuned for the room.

Ceremony

Part of our preparations involves outlining exactly what portions of the wedding day East Coast Soul will be involved with. For this wedding in particular, Alison & Ruben were also interested in East Coast Soul to help out for their ceremony. Alison & Ruben 's ceremony . East Coast Soul prepared a a Solo Piano performance and Single Mic for speeches. Following East Coast Soul performing approximately 30 minutes of “prelude” music as guests found their seats, the ceremony took place.

Cocktail Hour

As is common, East Coast Soul was requested to perform cocktail hour music. Cocktail hour is a great opportunity for the bride and groom to unwind after the heightened emotions of the ceremony. We do our part by providing a blend of relaxed music for guests to enjoy. In this case, We provided a Playback and and featured music by artists such as Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and more.

Reception

In a lion's share of wedding celebrations, the band is asked to provide MC services for the formal portions of the receptions. This Fairmount Park Horticulture Center Wedding was no different. However, there were actually no formal intros for this wedding.

The couple’s First Dance

With no introductions to take care of, we transitioned into the couple’s first dance.

The groom and bride's first dance is consistently one of the most emotional parts of the wedding day. It's a chance for the bride and groom to take a moment for themselves. For this wedding in particular, we were requested to play the first dance number live, instead of performing it from a recording. With this portion of the wedding finished, the guests and vendors took a break for dinner. After as short a break as possible, East Coast Soul's Philadelphia International ensemble returned to the stage.

Parent Dances

In a majority of weddings, East Coast Soul is often requested to play the couple's parent dances. This was a chance for the to join Alison & Ruben to share a brief moment in the middle of the dancefloor with their father and mother. For this wedding in particular, the bride and her father danced together. Ruben and his mother danced together as well. Parent dances are an amazing way to kick off the dance party portion of the evening. We often ask guests to join the couple and their parents on the dance floor, and then move directly in to the rest of the performance.

Dance Party

our shows commonly kick off with vintage material. We've discovered this is an excellent approach to get everyone relaxed and dancing with songs they're familiar with. Artists like Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, and more dominated the outset of our performance. We then moved into performing music by artists like Whitney Houston, Prince, Michael Jackson and more. Finally, we ended the night performing contemporary material that everyone could sing along with.

Guests danced non-stop from beginning to end, and we limited our breaks to ensure people had as much time to dance as possible.

Thanks so much to Alison & Ruben for having us at their beautiful September wedding at Fairmount Park Horticulture Center!