Making a Grand Entrance

Being Introduced Into the Room

Making an unforgettable entrance to your wedding reception is now a top trend. While there are some couples who happily embrace the traditional method – the emcee announces each bridal party member, parent and the couple by name, and everyone cheers as these honored people walk into the room – many of our New Jersey and New York City wedding couples ask for a more creative Grand Entrance.

Here are the top new trends for making your entrance into your wedding reception venue:

• The deejay or band plays an upbeat song for the bridal party’s introductions, at which point the couples dance their way into the room. When it’s the parents’ turn to be announced, the music switches to a different, upbeat song chosen just for them. The wedding couple then gets a different song. (Our favorite New Jersey wedding deejays and bands can provide you with lists of song ideas.)
• Our New Jersey wedding couples are big sports fans, so they may choose stadium music to get the crowd excited, and then everyone gets introduced into the reception room by name, title and where they went to school – just like professional athletes announce themselves during game telecasts. Even the flowergirls and ringbearers are introduced with their school names.
• Cultural music is now more often played for the entrance into the wedding reception site.
• To shorten the process if you have a large bridal party, have all of the bridesmaids introduced into the room to their own song, then all of the groomsmen – each in a group, not one at a time.
• Before anyone makes a grand entrance into the reception venue, guests’ attention is directed to a large-screen television, where a specially-produced video about the couple – or made by the couple – plays. These wedding videos feature family members and friends talking about the couple, the bride and groom talking about each other, funny stories about their first date, and more personalized wedding details. After the video is done, the grand entrances begin, to a top wedding song played by your wedding entertainers.
• Since many couples and bridal parties join their guests at the cocktail party, some choose to skip the lengthy introductions for bridal party members, and just have the parents and themselves introduced into the reception ballroom by their entertainers.
• Taking a cue from Dancing With the Stars, more wedding couples dance onto the dance floor, as part of their First Dance performance, such as with a tango that leads them through the doors and onto the ballroom dance floor, surprising the crowd with its drama.