The Hildene Wedding in Manchester, VT

East Coast Soul was blessed to be invited to join Megan & Andrew for their stunning The Hildene Wedding in .

Preprations for Megan & Andrew's Big Day

Our groundwork for the wedding began many weeks prior, with Megan & Andrew offering a myriad of musical and logistical options with us for the wedding (we always leave an excess of time for preparation). Megan & Andrew were heavily involved in this advanced planning and incredibly helpful throughout.

Once the wedding arrived, East Coast Soul traveled to and carried out our normal load-in, set up, and sound check process for The Hildene 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

In this case, East Coast Soul was not involved with couple's ceremony, with those arrangements having already been taken care of.

Cocktail Hour

As is often the case, 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 intense emotions of the ceremony. We contribute by providing a blend of relaxed music for guests to listend to. In this case, We provided a Piano/Sax Duo and and featured music by artists such as Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and more.

Reception

In a majority of wedding celebrations, we is asked to provide MC services for the formal portions of the celebrations. This The Hildene Wedding was no different. However, there were in fact 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 almost always one of the most emotional parts of the wedding. It's an opportunity for the bride and groom to take a moment for themselves. For this particular wedding, we were asked to play the first dance number live, instead of performing it from a recording. Megan & Andrew danced to You Are The Best Thing by Ray LaMontagne, which everyone thoroughly enjoyed. With this part of the evening complete, the guests and vendors took a break for dinner. After a super brief break, East Coast Soul's King ensemble circled back to the stage.

Parent Dances

The Parent Dance was combined, and they song chosen was Forever Young by Bob Dylan.

Dance Party

East Coast Soul dance performances often start with older material. We've found this is a great way to get guests up on the dance floor with songs they're familiar with. Artists like Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, Earth Wind & Fire, 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 Megan & Andrew for having us at their beautiful July wedding at The Hildene! And thank you to Jenelle Kappe for sharing these beautiful photos with us!