I’ve mentioned my increasingly-popular live wedding first-dance mixes a few times, but you can’t really understand until you see me perform one, so for the last one I did, I enlisted the assistance of San Diego Wedding Planner Amy Anderson (Affairs By Amy) to get video of the dance while I set up a camera to get video of the turntables. The result? I’m able to demonstrate the full effect now with a multi-view video of the Charest’s first dance, mixed live The Creative Music DJ-style!

Wedding Mix Tracklist:

Bad Meets Evil – Lighters
J Dash – Wop
Michael Jackson – Billie Jean
Sir Mix-a-lot – Jump On It
Bad Meets Evil – Lighters (outro)

Client: PJ and Louanne Charest

Venue: Marine Corps Community Services, MCRD San Diego – Bayview Room

Venue Address: Marine Corps Recuit Depot, 3800 Chosin Avenue, San Diego, CA 92140

Number of guests: 150+
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Enhanced Dance Floor Lighting, Live First Dance Mix

On-site Coordinator: Shelly
Photobooth: 360 Photobooth
Photography: Patricia Lucia Photography
Florist: Branches Floral Studio

Mount Woodson Castle – Grand Re-opening Party

Client: Bridal Insider and Personal Touch Dining
Venue: Mt Woodson Castle
Venue Address: 16302 N Woodson Dr, Ramona CA 92065
Number of guests: 300+
Services Provided: Monogram Lighting, Event Uplighting (computerized)

In October of 2010 Eve and Lori of Bridal Insider contacted me to discuss the opportunity to provide lighting for their upcoming event, “An Evening At Mt. Woodson.” As many know, this year I was a featured vendor on Bridal Insider’s blogs, and they also featured one of my blogs on their ‘Real Weddings’ listings. Knowing that I’m knowledgeable with lighting, they asked if I could demonstrate lighting ideas, and I was happy to oblige.

The event took place on November 17th, 2010. To be able to effective demonstrate the flexibility of modern state-of-the-art lighting techniques, I set up 12 uplights in the Castle’s front patio area. For my more technical readers, they were all connected via DMX cable which then fed into a laptop. From the laptop, I was able to control the lights in many different ways. I spent days before the event creating different creative color patterns which changed with a click of a button. When I wasn’t consulting with a guest, I would pick a random ‘scene’ that I had set up and let the lights do their thing. When guests came over to talk, I would show them my ability to change the color of the lights instantly.

Here’s a couple pictures and some video from the event.

For those considering Mt Woodson Castle for their venue, I highly recommend good use of lighting. As you can see, it can really change the way the venue looks.

Bali Hai – Little Wedding

Client: Sarah (Yslas) and Curtis Little
Venue: Bali Hai – South Pacific Room and Bayside Patio
Venue Address: 2230 Shelter Island Drive, San Diego, CA 92106
Number of guests: Approximately 50
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Wedding Video Montage Projection, Uplighting, Monogram Creation and Projection
Photographers: RHS Photo (Richard)
Linens: All Seasons Party Rentals
Officiant: Reverend Renate Daversa
Florist: Point Loma Village Florist (Nancy)
Cake: Flour Power

In June, Sarah Yslas contacted me to DJ her wedding. We discussed details over email since she was stationed out of state at the time. She showed particular interest in the monogram and uplighting, which I think was the main attraction to my services in the first place. Being that she was unable to meet in person, I instead scheduled a meeting with her fiancee, Curtis Little. Curtis and I met and instantly hit it off. Besides similar music tastes, we shared conversations of iPhones, Camaros (we both own one), and numerous other similar interests. Of course, we also discussed several details of their wedding, and Curtis was able to give me a good insight into what they were looking for, as well as the things that Sarah would be interested in. After a great meeting, we parted ways and I hit up Sarah a day later to get her input.

Amazingly enough, Curtis was spot-on when it came to Sarah’s tastes! If he said she wouldn’t care about it, she didn’t care about it. If he said she’d definitely be interested, she was absolutely interested. He really knows her well!

Sarah had distinct ideas about what she wanted for her monogram. Most DJ services only have the ability to get a monogram made from list of templates, but this wouldn’t do for Sarah. She was interested in a very unique monogram. She wanted Hawaiian flowers (Hibiscus) with butterflies of different sizes peppered throughout. Lucky for her I do monograms from scratch! I had her send me several pictures and ideas she liked, and we ended up finding one that fit the bill– A combination of butterfly made in the image of the hibiscus flower! Here’s the final design I sent off to be built. Note that it uses gradients, therefore cannot be done using laser-cut metal, so Sarah went with a glass gobo. I rarely have the opportunity to do glass gobos (they are twice as expensive as metal) so I was delighted at this opportunity.

On Nov 7th, 2010, I arrived early and set up the equipment and lighting.

My equipment. Clean and professional as always.

Table underlighting.

A unique method of displaying the monogram– I projected it through the linens of the cake table. It looked great, as you can see here.

The ceremony was held at Bali Hai’s Bayside Patio. I like to be as out-of-the-scene as possible, so I used a 50ft extension cord to position myself out of the picture.

I also positioned a speaker in the direct center of the ceremony site, hidden in the foilage. A very discrete setup, in my opinion.

The ceremony was short and sweet. Sarah and Curtis both had custom vows made to say to each other, which was nice.

Guests seating (Prelude): Various string quartet
Flower Girl and Ring Bearer (dog): “Kisses and Cake” by John Powell (from P.S. I Love You)
Bridesmaids/Groomsmen entrance: “Only Time” by Enya (from Sweet November)
Bride entrance: “To Get Me to You” by Lila McCann (from Hope Floats)
Recessional: “Forrest Gump Theme” by Alan Silvestri (from Forrest Gump)

Cocktail hour was done in the patio area. For this section, I played Hawaiian and island-themed music.

Grand Entrance: Black Eyed Peas – I Gotta Feeling

Directly after Grand Entrance we began lunch. Towards the end of lunch, Sarah gave a tribute to her mom, who had recently passed away. After her speech, I played a tribute song as well.

Tribute to Mom: Carrie Underwood – Mama’s Song

We then began a video montage that was created by one of Sarah’s bridesmaids. I used my projector and screen, and even though it was daytime, the power of the projector I used was able to display the images clear and vibrant. I combined some pictures to hopefully give an idea of the layout and interest of the guests.

After the montage was done, I did a “seated introduction” of the bridal party, asking each person to stand up as their name was called. The introductions ended with the best man, which segued nicely into toasts, beginning with him. After toasts, we began the First Dance.

First Dance: Edwin McCain – I’ll Be

Father Daughter Dance: Heartland – I Loved Her First

Following the Father Daughter dance, I invited Sarah and her bridesmaids to the floor to perform their version of the Evolution of Dance. Sarah and I had worked together to put together this megamix of popular line dance songs, which took about four versions of my remixes to get just right. She then got together with her bridesmaids and they practiced a choreographed routine to the mix. Here’s some pictures of their dance.

I set up a video recorder to capture the dance as well. It’s not perfect, but still manages to capture a lot of the energy.

We had a short amount of time for open dance, and unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures of it…

After the wedding I did manage to grab the bride and groom for a post-reception picture before they went out front for their grand exit in a limousine.

Congratulations to Sarah and Curtis Little, and thanks for having me along on your special day. And special thanks to Curtis for introducing me to a very cool way to display monograms that I will be demonstrating to future clients!

San Diego Botanic Gardens – Blazevich Wedding

Client: Karen and John Blazevich
Venue: San Diego Botanic Gardens – Walled Garden and The Victorian Gazebo
Venue Address: 230 Quail Gardens Drive, Encinitas CA
Number of guests: Approximately 170
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Dance Floor Lighting, Wedding Video Montage Creation, Wedding Video Montage Projection

Wedding Coordinator: InStyle Event Planning (Shellie Ferrer)
Invitations: InStyle Event Planning (Amanda Hallock)
Photographers: Debora Barreto and Debra Henry
Videography: Adam Bledsoe
Officiant: The Honorable Vincent J. Brown
Guitarist: Miles Moynier
Cake: VG Donuts and Bakery

In July, Karen and John Blazevich contacted me to DJ their wedding. We met to discuss details, and they were very excited that I knew the San Diego Botanic Gardens well so I could help them with ideas on how to best have a reception there. They also planned to use a live guitarist for ceremony and cocktail hour, but wanted my package of ceremony PA and microphone to use for their wedding ceremony.

The ceremony was held in the Walled Garden. I set up a wireless microphone and speaker which worked well for their needs.

Immediately after the ceremony, John and Karen left in a Rolls Royce to take pictures at the beach.

Cocktail hour was done in the Victorian Gazebo area, and the first hour was done by Miles Moynier.

Once Miles was finished, I took over for a bit since John and Karen were not back from the beach yet. For this venue, I used a JBL Eon speaker with my DJ Skirt equipment dressing. Due to venue sound restrictions, this was ample sound for their needs and conformed well with venue sound policies. I also set up a projector using a belly bar table in preparation for their wedding video montage.

Grand Entrance (Bridal Party): The Beatles – All You Need Is Love
Grand Entrance (Bride and Groom): James Brown – Get On Up

After a round of applause we began dinner. Following dinner, we started toasts.

Best man toast:

First Dance: Ben Harper – Forever

Video of the first dance (provided by Kristen Blazevich, John’s sister who also provided many of the pictures in this blog)

Father Daughter Dance: Temptations – My Girl

Mother Son: Barry Manilow – I Am Your Child
Stepmother Son: Frank Sinatra – The Way You Look Tonight

John and Karen took advantage of my video montage creation service, where they sent me digital pictures and I put them together into an incredibly vibrant montage video. Here’s a picture of them and their guests enjoying the montage. For some reason my clients who pick this venue always seem to want my montage creation service too, and it always goes over wonderfully!

And when we got to open dance… wow! Packed dance floor is an understatement. You can see in the pictures that people were dancing on the sides and off of the dance floor. That’s what I call a good dance floor!

After a while we took a break for cake cutting and tosses.

Cake Cutting: U2 – The Sweetest Thing

Bouquet toss: Beyonce – Single Ladies

<no picture of this yet>

Garter toss: Marvin Gaye – Let’s Get It On

Back to open dancing…

Great dance floor, huh?

After the reception was over, I got a picture with the wedding coordinators (Shellie Ferrer and Lacy Hunter) and myself. Shellie has since contacted me about some clients next year that are looking for a great DJ, so I know I’ll be seeing her and Lacy again soon.

And of course, my post-reception picture with the happy bride and groom. I asked John what him and his guests thought of my performance, his reply was, “I don’t think there was a single song that we didn’t enjoy. We gave you what? 12 songs? And you nailed it with the rest of them!”

I thought maybe one of my song choices wasn’t the best, but I’ll happily go with ‘the customer is always right’ especially when the customer’s claim is better than my own!

Congratulations to the Blazevichs’ and their families. I truly had a blast being a part of your most special day.

E l Cortez – Barbolla Wedding

Client: Andrew and Carmen Barbolla
Venue: El Cortez – Don Room
Venue Address: 702 Ash Street, Suite A, San Diego, CA 92101

Number of guests: approximately 150
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Enhanced Dance Floor Lighting, Wedding Video Montage

Wedding Coordination: Kelly Hath

This was the first of two weddings I had this week.

Carmen Mosley and Andrew Barbolla contacted me in May to inquire about wedding services. They were getting married at El Cortez, and wanted someone who could DJ and MC, knew their genres of music (70s disco & 80s funk, as well as current hits and some latin). Carmen was out of town but arranged a phone meeting with her fiancee. After talking with him, they decided to book with me.

Months later, Carmen returned to San Diego and arranged to meet in-person. At that time she learned about my wedding video montage creation service and decided to add it on to their package. For those that are not aware, I provide a service where clients can give me up to 100 pictures and I will create their montage for them, using professional video editing software to create eye-catching montages complete with custom transitions, including effects such as ken burns and book zoom. At the wedding I will then project the created montage using high-powered projectors and large projector screens.

When I arrived at El Cortez, the band that was scheduled to play had already taken up their spot. I set up my system next to theirs, and placed my speakers on either side of the stairs. Because of the shape of the room (octagonal, and rather round), bass has to be kept minimal or else you get an echo effect that ruins the sound. I set my subwoofer on “1″ and it seemed to work great.

Since I use vinyl, many times I like to ask my clients what their wedding colors are and try to match their decor with a similar shade of vinyl. They told me that their main color was purple so I brought my purple vinyl. What they didn’t mention was that their secondary color was a brownish orange. How fateful it was that the labels to my purple vinyls were almost the exact same shade! I couldn’t have planned it any better if I had tried. Check it out!

For ceremony, Carmen and Andrew went with a string quartet.

Seating Music: Brandenburg Concerto No. 3
Processional Bridal Party Music: Three Divertimenti
Bride’s Processional Music: Pachelbel’s Canon in D
Recessional Music: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik

After ceremony, guests went outside to enjoy a cocktail hour while I played some light listening music for anyone who might venture inside.

Introductions went well, as Carmen and Andrew chose to only have themselves introduced as “Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Barbolla”.

Dinner began, and afterwards we started toasts. This is when the rest of the bridal party was introduced. Toasts were done in the following order.

Best Man: Dennis Kavanagh
Matron of Honor: Vivian Boos
Father of Bride: Jerome Mosley
Mother of Groom: Diane Barbolla
Bridesmaid: Danielle Egan

After toasts, we began dances. Instead of using my camera, I let my video recorder run and recorded the dances. Here’s some frames from the video I captured.

First Dance Music: Adele – Make You Feel My Love

Father/Daughter Music: Frank Sinatra – The Way You Look Tonight

Mother/Son Music: Toby Lightman – Better 

 Halfway through the dance, the groom switched to dancing with his grandmother, and the Best Man graciously took over dancing with his mom.

..

After the dances it was time for open dancing, and this was a good dance group. They shuffled their feet to 70′s, 80′s, even some 50′s.

After about 45 minutes, it was time for their friend’s band to play. They were known as Bedford Grove, and had a blues/folk sound to them. They played for about 45 mins, and then turned the dance floor back over to me. They were actually really cool people, and when they weren’t playing they were on the dance floor getting their groove on. One of two of them even made some requests, and I was able to get one of their requests into my set.

I started my second set, but with a twist. The bride and groom had arranged a “crazy half hour” in which I brought a pre-planned bag of props to the dance floor, dumped them all out, and told guests to grab whatever they wanted because we were about to do a bunch of follow-along songs in the next “crazy half hour”. The guests loved it, and it was fun to watch them dance wearing masks, hats, and other assorted apparel. I mixed songs like a madman, weaving through all the classics (cheesy and non-cheesy), and watching the dancefloor with amusement. After the crazy half hour was up, I transitioned into some good dance music and kept the floor going with guests who were even more enthusiastic than the first set. So enthusiastic, in fact, that when it came time for cake cutting, bouquet toss, and garter toss, they asked if they could just do the cake cutting and then skip the rest so they could dance more. I had no problem honoring that request.

I actually have video of the dancing, including the “crazy half hour”. I will post it up as soon as I go through it.

Cake cutting was done to a combination of Rathergood’s “Cake” and Eileen Barton’s “If I knew you were coming (I’d have baked a cake)”.

Open dancing commenced and they danced right up til the very end, after which Carmen and Andrew were happy to pose with me for a post-reception picture. I love the fact that she still has on her mask from the crazy half hour! As a matter of fact, she never took it off during the whole time after that half hour. I think she even has it on in her cake cutting photos, but I haven’t received any to verify that yet!

The Wood House at Woodland Park in San Marcos – Evan and Natasha’s Wedding

Client: Susan Dewindt on behalf of Evan Dewindt
Venue: The Historic Wood House at Woodland Park
Venue Address: 1148 Rock Springs Rd., San Marcos, CA, 92079
Number of guests: 115
Services Provided: DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Dance Floor Lighting, Video Montage, Wedding Ceremony

Wedding Coordination: Opal Martin of Allie’s Party Equipment Rental
Photography: Sage Taylor Photography
Catering: Allie’s Party Equipment Rental

Earlier this year Susan Dewindt contacted me for her son’s wedding. We met at the wedding venue to discuss details, and worked out the details. The Wood House is a historic building located at the top of Woodland Park in San Marcos, directly below the public pool area. I wish I could supply more information than that about this venue, but the history of it seems to be rather secret, and I haven’t found a single website that elaborates on it.

The Historic Wood House in San Marcos

We sat down at the venue to discuss additional enhancements for the wedding (we are a full-service entertainment company, after all) and Susan decided to add the video montage package after viewing some of the recent slideshows that I have created for clients.

The ceremony was a lot of fun. Natasha and Evan were not looking for a traditional ceremony with traditional music, and to make sure that happened they spent time with their bridal party choreographing a bridal party introduction routine to Black Eyed Peas’ “Alive”. Although my camera wasn’t in a good spot to get some of the details, I did manage to get a decent amount of the routine on video. Enjoy!

The reception area at the Wood House is nice and large and guests enjoyed great appetizers from Allie’s Party Rentals while I played a customized playlist well-tailored for this particular crowd. Song choices included Reasons to Love You by Meiko and You Look Wonderful by Slightly Stoopid. As you can tell, this wasn’t your ordinary cocktail playlist. It was many of the couple’s requests, complemented by similar songs with similar themes. Truly a challenge, with a rewarding outcome.

Since this was an outdoor wedding and it was a bit sunny and hot, precautions had to be taken to protect my equipment (and me!) from the elements, all the while keeping the clean and professional set up I’m known for.

My view…

The wedding started a bit late so we had to adjust the timing of events to compensate. Luckily , I was not alone with the planning. I had the help of their day-of coordinator, Opal Martin, to work with. It’s always nice to work with a competent and friendly coordinator. Together, we were able to mitigate some of the scheduling issues and make everything work well. When we needed some extra time, I threw in the “Shoe Game” to entertain the party, and it went over really well. We also did the “Anniversary Dance” since there were a lot of married couples in the guest list. The winning couple had been together for 60 years!!!

Dances:

First dance – Can’t Help Falling In Love (UB40)
Father/Daughter – I Loved Her First (Heartland)
Mother/Son – Beautiful Boy (Celine Dion)

After the sun set, we were able to project the slideshow. I used my DaLite projector screen, which is 7′ wide and 7+’ tall. The projection was beautiful. My projector is extremely bright and as such doesn’t let me take pictures of the projection well, but here’s a shot of the set up and the guests and bride and groom enjoying the montage.

For open dancing, I was given a rather eclectic playlist of the bridal party’s favorite songs, largely centered around electronic dance music (EDM). I really enjoyed my set because it was definitely out of the typical wedding genre. I actually enjoyed it so much that I ended up hitting ‘record’ on my system, and after tossing some ‘drops’ in it, I’m posting it here for all readers to listen to and even download if they wish.

Creative Music DJs – July Live Wedding Clip

The reception ended with a fast dance, and the mother of the bride actually requested an encore song which I obliged with, and then the mother of the groom came up and wanted ANOTHER encore song. This group of guests just did not want to stop dancing!

After the reception, guests gathered around for a group picture, which I became a part of as well. It was pretty dark so I had to do some editing to make everyone visible.

And I just LOVE the happy expressions of both Natasha and Evan in this one.

Congratulations to Natasha and Evan, thanks for having me along for the celebration, and best wishes for continued years of happiness. You both have known each other since second grade, and you answered most of the questions the same during the Shoe Game. I’d say this one is going to last!

After the big day, I contacted Susan, the mother of the groom, who posted a review on InsiderPages (http://www.insiderpages.com/b/15253916392/creative-music-djs-san-diego) which says this:

“Dennis did such an incredible job at my son’s wedding. Even with some very last minute changes minutes before the wedding started, Dennis was able to pull it off. He is great with the crowd and kept everyone dancing up to the very end!”

Point Loma DJ – Creative Music DJs

Client: Danna Gunther
Venue: Personal Residence
Venue Address: Point Loma
Number of guests: 35+
Services Provided: DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Video Montage
Catering: Crown Point Catering

Danna Gunther contacted me a while back to DJ her daughter’s upcoming 21^st birthday at her home in Point Loma. Her daughter wanted a DJ, but was concerned about finding one that knew her favorite music. I suggested we meet, and arranged a meeting at their house where Danna, Olivia, Amy (Olivia’s older sister), and Jeff (Danna’s husband) would be present. We met and started talking about music, and by the end of meeting Olivia told her mom that she thought I would be perfect for the party.

While talking with Danna I showed her some other packages that I offer and she really liked the video montage idea, since she wanted to be able to give a copy of a video montage on DVD to Olivia for her birthday. I worked both the creation and projection into the contract, and they signed up.

On Olivia’s birthday, I arrived early and set up my system. I knew it was going to be an interesting night because Olivia’s favorite music wasn’t necessarily dance music, it was more along the lines of Jack’s Mannequin, The Fray, and Citizen Cope. I was told there would be no dancing, to which I replied, “OK, but let’s leave an area open just in case dancing begins.”

Catering was provided by Crown Point Catering, and the food was excellent.

Working with Crown Point Catering

Several guests gave compliments on the music selection, and things went well. It started raining,  but it was light and the guests were enjoying the atmosphere so much that they remained outside! As the night progressed, I started mixing club-versions (redrums) of some of Olivia’s requested songs, mixed with crowd-pleasers and even some oldies and current top-40. Ironically, the first person to start dancing was Danna, the one that had been adamant about the fact that ‘there will be no dancing’! Needless to say, dancing did happen, as I knew it would. While the party was going on, Olivia took a moment to pose with me. She looks amazing, doesn’t she?

DJ Dennis J with the 21 year old Birthday girl, Olivia

After dinner and some light dancing, I made the announcement that we had prepared a special slideshow chronicling Olivia’s life from birth until now, and started the slideshow. The guests loved it. The lycra DJ screen is about 10’ wide, so the presentation was beautifully large as you can see here.

Olivia's Presentation on my new DJ Screen

After the party was over, Olivia and her friends left in a limo to hit up bars in the Pacific Beach area (as any 21 year old would do) and I spent some time packing up and chatting with Danna and Jeff, who said everyone really loved the music and that they will be calling me for Jeff’s 60^th birthday party in a couple years. I took the opportunity to get a quick snapshot of my happy client.

DJ Dennis J with Danna

Thanks to Danna for giving me the opportunity to entertain her daughter’s guests for an evening, and happy birthday, Olivia!

Dave and Busters – San Diego State University (SDSU) Appreciation Party

Client: April Hsu on behalf of SDSU NSMH, SDSU MESA, and SDSU HTMSA
Venue: Dave & Buster’s – San Diego
Venue Address: 2931 Camino del Rio North ,San Diego , CA 92108
Number of guests: 100+
Services Provided: DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Dance Floor Lighting, Video Montage

April Chu from SDSU’s National Society of Minorities in Hospitality (NSMH) contacted me a while back looking for a licensed and insured DJ for their organization’s appreciation party. Apparently they had a few DJs that they knew personally that wanted to perform, but Dave & Busters has a strict policy requiring licensed and insured performers. This just emphasizes how important it is to be licensed and insured here in San Diego, right?

April and I met at Dave and Busters to work out the details. They wanted dance floor lighting, a video montage, and of course GREAT music and club-style mixing.

The night of the event everything went well. For the first 1/4 of the night they served appetizers and drinks, and I played an instrumental medley of today’s top-40 songs to accompany it. These were college students, after all!

After appetizers, there was an awards ceremony at which there were many prizes given out. After that they did a recognition of new board members, and a raffle. Then, it was our turn.

The dance floor filled slowly but steadily, and by end of the second song, it was pretty full! Guests enjoyed cleverly mixed top-4o, club, rock and even a bit of hip-hop. There were a few requests, and I was able to get most of them in during the short amount of dance time that was left. Primo Desiderio came out to hang out and enjoy the performance, and ended up taking a decent amount of video for me, which I’ve compiled into an enjoyable clip below. This is one of the best videos of a Creative Music DJs performance so far, so I must express thanks!

Mike Nunez also came to hang out, and being a very good photographer, he took some amazing shots of me in action. See what you think. I think they’re excellent!

At the end of performance, you’ll notice one of the attendees performing a number to Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal”. I was told he knows the dance to most Michael Jackson songs so at the end of the night I held a vote for an MJ song and Smooth Criminal won. After I saw him perform I now wish we had a lot more time so we could see more of his moves!

After dancing was over, guests came over to thank me, April expressed her satisfaction over the performance, and a few bartenders from Dave and Busters remarked on how much they enjoyed the music.

Thanks to April Chu and SDSU for allowing us to be part of their celebration, and we’ll see you next year!

Tom Ham’s Lighthouse Wedding – Willie and Johanna Asaro

Client: Willie and Johanna Asaro
Venue: Tom Ham’s Lighthouse – California Room
Venue Address: 2150 Harbor Island Drive, San Diego, CA 92101-1084
Number of guests: approximately 218
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Event Uplighting (10 lights), Video Montage, Enhanced Dance Floor Lighting

Wedding Coordination: Nanette Jimenez
Photography: Xavier Bailey
Videography: NR3 Video Productions

William (Willie) and Johanna Asaro contacted me around the end of last year to discuss their wedding. We met and talked about ideas that they both had, and by the end of the meeting we both had an ideal vision of what wil his has to be one of the most eventful weddings I have done in a long time. However, they had some meetings with other DJs planned, so they didn’t sign up right away (hey, it happens!).  A week later, I received an email from Willie to the effect of “We knew almost instantly that you were THE GUY to host our wedding, and we would be very happy to hire for the evening of our wedding. (May 1st, 2010 – Just as a reminder ) We really appreciate your time, knowledge, and interest in our wedding and are looking forward to working with you!” It was an exciting e-mail, because Willie and Johanna are a very energetic and electric couple, and I knew their wedding was going to be incredible.

Willie and Johanna chose the California Room at Tom Ham’s Lighthouse as their reception location. Two sides of the room are composed of windows overlooking the ocean, and provide an amazing view to complement an event.The California Room is 3000 square feet, and is stated to hold up to 600 people. In reality, it was pretty packed and we had a little over 200.

Tom Ham's Lighthouse Wedding Guests

The reception began well. The ceremony had ended much earlier than planned, so guests had been milling in for a while. Introductions were done to “Black Eyed Peas – I Gotta Feeling”, and while the bridesmaids helped Johanna get her train removed for their first dance, I let the song continue to play and then invited everyone to enthusiastically sing the last verse together. There’s something about 200 people smiling, clapping, and all singing BEP loudly that just set the mood instantly to “party”!

For the first dance, a live number was sung. The song was called, “Then”, and was sung by Rick Ryan while being accompanied on guitar by the best man and brother of the groom, Charlie Asaro. It was a beautiful and inspiring song, and I believe it was written just for the Asaros. It was captured on video by an incredibly talented duo of Norma and John, more commonly known as NR3 Video Productions, while the photographer, Xavier Bailey, captured some amazing photographs as well.

Willie decided he wanted to do the video montage about 2/3 of the way through dinner, with the original plan to continue rounds while it was playing. Anyone want to guess how well that plan went? Not well! The wedding montage was a record-breaking 25 minutes(!) and once people were enjoying it, the round-making pretty much halted. That’s what happens when you have an amazing video for your guests to watch though, right? The video was an overwhelming success, and luckily I was able to capture a few seconds of guests as well as the bride and groom enjoying it.

At the end of the dinner, NR3 and Xavier got into position and we began toasts, followed by parent dances, a honeymoon dance, and bouquet/garter tosses.  We then opened the dance floor for some dancing. But, we had another surprise in store for everyone… Tom Ham’s actually allowed the use of fog! Using a special hazer, I started spreading a light level of haze over the dance floor and soon it was like “Club Asaro” in there! Maybe that’s one of the reasons why so many guests were still present at the end of the night, but I like to think it had something to do with my mixes and song selection as well.

Cake cutting went well. The cake was huge, and included a unique touch in the form of a cake-topper. Instead of figures of a bride and groom, it was a hot air balloon. This topper symbolized the location where Willie proposed to Johanna– while they were getting onto a hot air balloon! Originally we planned to display the montage after the cake cutting, to provide an atmosphere for guests to enjoy cake. Since the video had already been shown, I improvised and took the bride and groom through a journey of the Shoe Game. Which Willie won, I may add, if for no other reason than the fact that Johanna got caught cheating twice! haha

The rest of the night was full of open dancing with song selections consisting of several of Willie and Johanna’s favorites, a set of 90′s hip-hop, 80′s rock and alternative, and of course today’s chart-topping hits! I was a bit busy mixing so I didn’t get to get video of most of it, but towards the end I captured two clips, one of everyone doing a train (notice there’s not a single chair occupied!) and another of the bride and groom and friends dancing their hearts out to their introduction song. The video captures the energy pretty well, wouldn’t you say?

The night ended with a last dance song to Abba – The Winner Takes It All.

Last Dance at Tom Ham's Lighthouse

Afterwards, Willie and Johanna stuck around and said goodbye to their guests. Willie came over and thanked me for my service, and mentioned that he would “recommend me to anyone, any time”. I took the opportunity to get a post-event picture with them and Johanna’s mother, Nanette Jimenez.

DJ Dennis J with Willie and Johanna Asaro

DJ Dennis J with Johanna's mother, Nanette Jimenez

Congratulations to Willie and Johanna Asaro, and thanks once again for inviting me to be a part of their special night!

Liberty Station Birthday Party – Rita and Rosalie

Client: Jim Fitzpatrick
Venue: Liberty Station – Luce Court
Venue Address: 2640 Historic Decatur Road
Number of guests: 100
Services Provided: DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Dance Floor Lighting, Video Montage

A few months ago I was contacted by Jim Fitzpatrick to perform at his wife, Rita,(and her twin sister, Rosalie)’s 50th birthday party. Jim and Rita first saw me perform in Liberty Station at the Spirits At Liberty Station fundraiser in October 2009. According to Rita, after they saw me there, they both said to each other, “we have to hire this guy when we have a party!” Of course, all of this was unknown to me until just recently…

Jim and I met at his office downtown and worked out the details. They wanted dance floor lighting (“light it up like a CLUB!” was their request), and also opted for the video montage package. I coached Jim a bit about the type of pictures he should include in the montage, and gave advise about creating it. Jim hit a few snags along the way while creating his montage, and we were on the phone frequently towards the days before the event making sure he had all the details correct. At one point, I even invited Jim over to our house for a consultation and to preview the montage on the actual projector we were using for his event. Needless to say, by the day of the event, Jim was completely confident that the montage was going to go over perfectly.

Jim and Rita selected Liberty Station for their venue, convenient for me since I had obviously worked at the venue before! They set up a tent in Luce Court, directly behind the NTC Promenade main entrance. The entire event was coordinated by Christine Ong, from Encore Events.

Tress Balch, from Happy’s Sushi, catered the party with a total of three stations. One was a sushi bar…

Sushi Bar

and two were hot food stations consisting of delicious items such as appetizers, shishkabobs and fried shrimp.

One of the hot bars

Appetizers and Hot Food

Bar service was provided by Jamie from Event Beverage Solutions. I’ll definitely recommend her in the future because she was extremely personable and friendly. She came over and offered me refills when she saw that I couldn’t leave my booth! Afterwards, when we were cleaning up she also complimented me on the mix, which was nice.

Liquor Bar

For this event, I chose to debut my new Cerwin Vega speaker set, which fit the decor well and provided more than ample sound. As you can see, it looks good. The tops are stylish and thin, yet contain two 8″ woofers each tuned to a different frequency range.

Cerwin Vega Speaker Setup

For cocktails and dinner, Jim left the music selection to me, so I started with some smooth jazz, moved into some ‘rat pack’ 20s-40s, and then transitioned into some easy listening and contemporary music such as Jason Mraz and Beach Boys. Since it was a birthday party, song selections were themed around celebration and wonderful lives.

Before dancing began, we started the video montage. The projector lit up the screen flawlessly, and Jim even remarked to me during the display, saying, “that’s an amazing projector you have.” I always try to explain to clients beforehand that our projector is not the ‘norm’ but it really has to be seen to fully understand what that means. We use an extremely high ‘lumens’ projector so that the whites remain white even over long distances and in low lighting (most projectors are made to be used in very dark settings, and cannot display whites correctly when there is lighting in the room). I took the occasion to get some video of the guests enjoying the video. I think that this video capture will help show you more about how the montage went over than the actual montage itself!

Here’s a shot of everyone enjoying the video montage.

Guests Enjoying the Video Montage

And here’s a short video showing guests enjoying the montage.

<video coming soon>

Now, when Jim and I had met, he had informed me that his wife was 50, but a “young 50″. So, I was thinking 70′s and 80′s would be the night’s big hits. However, before the dancing began, Rosalie came over and asked me if I could start with “Boom Boom Pow” since it was her son Wyatt’s favorite song. When it came time for dancing we started with Black Eyed Peas, then Jim came over and told me to ‘rock this place like a high school gym’.

The set definitely ebbed and flowed. I went through many genres: Uptempo club, 80′s Pop, 70′s Disco, 80′s Funk, Latin (Salsa, Merengue), 90′s Hip-Hop, Current Top40. Guests danced all night long, and the hosts felt that the night was going so well that they didn’t want to interrupt it for the cake event, so they just silently cut cake and gave it out subtly!

And that gesture in itself was the ultimate verification that the night was enjoyed by everyone!

A picture of Jim and his wife, Rita.

Jim and Rita Fitzpatrick

A picture of me with the birthday girls, Rita and Rosalie.

Rita Fitzpatrick and her sister Rosalie

A picture of the host and client, Jim Fitzpatrick, after a job well done!

Jim Fitzpatrick and DJ Dennis J, post-event