Fairmount Park Horticulture Center Wedding in Philadelphia, PA

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

Preprations for Alison & Ruben's Big Day

Our groundwork for the wedding day began well ahead, with Alison & Ruben sharing their music and logistical preferences and vision with us for the wedding day (we take our preparation process extremely seriously). Alison & Ruben were happy to be a key part of 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. We get a lot of questions about the logistics of loading in to any given venue. 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

One aspect of our groundwork 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 looking for 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 providing roughly 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 wonderful chance for the bride and groom to relax after the intense emotions of the ceremony. We contribute by performing a variety of relaxed music for guests to enjoy. In this case, We provided a Playback and and featured music by artists such as Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, and more.

Reception

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

The groom and bride’s First Dance

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

The bride and groom's first dance is consistently one of the most meaningful parts of the wedding day. It's a chance for the bride and groom to take a moment for themselves. For this specific wedding, we were asked to perform the first dance tune live, as opposed to playing it from a recording. With this portion of the evening finished, the guests and vendors took a break for dinner. After a quick break, East Coast Soul's Philadelphia International ensemble returned to the stage.

Parent Dances

In a majority of wedding performances, we are also asked to perform the couple's parent dances. This was a chance for the to join Alison & Ruben to share a brief moment on the dance floor with their father and mother. For this specific wedding, the bride and her father shared a dance. Ruben and his mother shared a dance as well. Parent dances are an amazing way to start the performance 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

East Coast Soul shows often start with older 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, The Temptations, Earth Wind & Fire, and more dominated the outset of our performance. We then transitioned into performing music by artists like Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Prince 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!