Wedding Song Dedications

In today’s world of personalized weddings, brides and grooms have arranged for their wedding entertainment to include specific songs from their much-loved playlists. Now, our New Jersey brides and grooms are following the top wedding entertainment trends and planning multiple song dedications for their receptions.

Here are some of the most sentimental and crowd-pleasing song dedication trends that you might wish to incorporate into your big day:

At the Start of the Reception

• After the first spotlight dances of your reception — including your first dance as husband and wife, your bride-and-father dance, the groom-and-mother dance, if you choose to include these – many wedding entertainment experts invite all of the couples onto the dance floor to enjoy this first spotlight dance, then remain on the dance floor for additional slow dance songs to follow it.
• If you’d prefer, you can instruct your wedding entertainment professional to read your song dedication made to your and your groom’s parents, inviting them to their own spotlight dance, as your thank-you for their help in planning your wedding. You choose a meaningful song for this dedication, and both or all sets of parents are invited to share it the moment, regardless of which parents paid more for the wedding. It’s fine etiquette and good family diplomacy to acknowledge all parents as equals.
• End your song dedications here, so that guests can take their seats to enjoy the first course of their dinner, and so that your song dedications don’t become an endless string of songs where all guests stand and watch someone else having all the fun. Spread out your song dedications over the course of the evening.

At the Start of the Fast-Dance Wedding Entertainment

• When the wedding entertainers, deejay or band, are ready to transition from slow-dance dinner music to dance music for the reception’s higher-energy portion, a great way to start the  action is to have the first fast-song announced as a dedication from the groom to the bride, or vice versa. It may be one of your favorite songs of all time, or the song you always play when getting ready for a big night out.
• Dedicate fast-dance songs to others, including:
  • Your bridal party members
  • Your friends, in an all-inclusive song dedication announcement, not a naming-of-names in a small circle, making others feel left out or diminished
  • Your cousins, also a strong trend that we’re seeing here at family-centric New Jersey weddings
  • To your kids, if you’re blending families or have children as a couple

At the Big, Symbolic Moments

When the cake is wheeled out in the dramatic presentation for the bride and groom to cut their first slice as husband and wife, you may choose this moment as the perfect moment for a song you’ll dedicate to your guests, as a very special thank-you for the ‘sweet’ gift of their traveling to share this day with you.

When you present your bouquet to your mother, grandmother or other special female, or toss your bouquet to your awaiting single female guests, choose a special song dedication that pay tribute to all of your women friends and relatives.

When you have your wedding entertainers play special cultural songs, the inclusion of those important rituals becomes a tribute that adds so much to your wedding celebration. At our West Orange wedding venue, we’ve hosted a large variety of cultural wedding celebrations from Indian to Italian, Japanese to Jewish, Polish, Colombian, Irish, and all manner of heritage-based weddings. Wedding entertainment for these festive weddings often includes special song dedications.

At the End of the Reception

Your wedding entertainment comes to a close with the last dance of the evening, and as bride and groom you may choose to propose a song dedication for this last number. This may be another of ‘your songs’ or a song that’s special to your family. At this point, you might take the microphone to propose your song dedication directly to each other, to your families and friends, and we’ve even enjoyed the surprise of our brides and grooms thanking us for bringing their wedding dreams to life. That’s music to our ears.

Best,

Michael Mahle, Director of Communications, Pleasantdale Château