River Road Farm Wedding in Manchester, VT

East Coast Soul was grateful to be asked to join Maggie & Jessie for their stunning River Road Farm Wedding in .

Preprations for Maggie & Jessie's Big Day

Our planning for the wedding began months in advance, with Maggie & Jessie expressing a variety of musical and logistical preferences with us for the wedding (preparation is a key part of our process). Maggie & Jessie were heavily involved in this advanced planning and a huge asset throughout.

Once the wedding arrived, East Coast Soul traveled to and carried out our normal load-in, set up, and sound check process for River Road Farm weddings. Being prepared for load-in and set-up at any given venue is a critical part of our workflow. 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 planning involves outlining exactly what portions of the wedding East Coast Soul will be involved with. For this wedding in particular, Maggie & Jessie were also interested in East Coast Soul to help out for their ceremony. Maggie & Jessie '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 arrived, the ceremony took place.

Cocktail Hour

As is often the case, East Coast Soul was asked to provide cocktail hour music. Cocktail hour is a great opportunity for the bride and groom to relax after the heightened 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 Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and more.

Reception

In a lion's share of celebrations, the band is asked to handle MC services for the formal portions of the celebrations. This River Road Farm 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 changed gears to into the couple’s first dance.

The newly married couple's first dance is consistently one of the most unforgettable parts of the wedding. It's a chance for the bride and groom to take a moment for themselves. For this particular wedding, we were requested to play the first dance tune live, instead of playing it from a recording. With this part of the wedding complete, the guests and vendors took a break for dinner. After a super brief break, East Coast Soul's Atlantic ensemble returned to the stage.

Parent Dances

In many weddings, East Coast Soul is often requested to play the couple's parent dances. This was a chance for the to join Maggie & Jessie to share a brief moment on the dance floor with their parents. For this particular wedding, the bride and her father shared a dance. Jessie and his mother shared a dance as well. Parent dances are a great way to kick off 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

our performances often start with older material. We've found this is a great way to get folks relaxed and dancing with songs they know and love. Artists like Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Sam and Dave, and more dominated the outset of our performance. We then moved 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 Maggie & Jessie for having us at their beautiful June wedding at River Road Farm! And thank you to Undressed Moments for sharing these beautiful photos with us!