LDS Wedding (Morman) – Adan and Arwen Martinez

Venue: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Cultural Hall)
Venue Address: 2255 Felicita Road, Escondido, CA
Number of guests: 150-160
Services Provided: Wedding DJ and Master of Ceremonies, Monogram Lighting

Venue Coordinator: Jacqueline Thompson
Officiant: Bishop Shaffer
Photography: Doyle Terry Photo

In March of 2010 Jacqueline Thompson contacted me to discuss the opportunity to DJ her clients’ (Adan Martinez and Arwen Lott) wedding. Being on the Church of Latter Day Saints’ preferred vendor list got her attention, and she thought that I would be a good fit for their style. We spent some time on the phone discussing LDS standards, especially when it came to music selection. I actually learned a few tips from her that will assist me in future LDS weddings I’m sure.

Adan and Arwen and I met at a bookstore and discussed details. I showed them some examples of lighting, genres for cocktail and dinner, and monograms. Adan was particularly interested in the monograms. We had a great meeting with plenty of chemistry, and they decided to book right away. They also made sure to add the monogram lighting to their package.

On the day of their reception, I arrived at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Escondido and set up my main equipment on the stage. Adan chose to put the monogram on the rear wall of the stage, so I pulled the rear curtain shut, taped it as well I could, and used it as the background for the monogram.

For the ceremony, Adan and Arwen had one standard to LDS, consisting of stadium circular seating. This arrangement is very unusual to those not familiar with the customs, but here’s a picture of how it looks.

And the actual ceremony…

Seating Music: Vitamin String Quartet

Processional (Parents and Bridesmaids): Robin Spielberg – Canon in D

Processional (Bride’s Entrance): Vitamin String Quartet – Your Guardian Angel

Recessional: John Williams – Imperial March (Darth Vader’s Theme)

Appetizer Hour (No drinking, so this wasn’t a cocktail hour!): Cocktail Jazz cover bands

Grand Entrance song: Olé- Bouncing Souls

Dinner was taking a little longer than anticipated, so we moved into their first dance.

First Dance: Time In a Bottle – Jim Croce

Father Daughter Dance: Rascal Flatts – I Won’t Let Go

Mother Son Dance: Juanes – Para Tu Amor

We then began a buffet-style dinner. During dinner, I got to chat a lot with the photographer, Doyle. Doyle was great to talk to, very professional and friendly.

After dinner, we kicked open dancing off with a hispanic traditional dance known as the La Vibora De La Mar. It can be done a lot of ways, but typically the bride and groom stand on chairs holding a veil between them. Since Arwen didn’t have a veil, they used a linen instead. While the song played, I sped it up and the challenge was for the dancers to keep up with tempo. We pitted the girls against the guys. The girls won. Easily.

I didn’t get many pictures of dancing, there were a lot of requests (I always welcome requests) so I spent lots of time interacting with guests. The hit genres for tonight were cumbias and spanish pop.

Cake Cutting: Jack Johnson – Better Together

Cake cutting got a bit messy…

After the cake cutting, we began the tosses.

Garter Toss: Flight Of The Conchords – Business Time

Bouquet Toss: Roy Orbison – Pretty Woman

After tosses we went back into open dancing. I ended up doing another 45 minute cumbia set.. Lots of good hispanic music!

Last Dance: <We just kept it upbeat>

Adan and Arwen left quickly after the reception was over, but I did get a chance to get my signature post-reception photo!

Congratulations to Adan and Arwen Martinez, and thank you for giving me the honor of being your Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS) Wedding DJ!

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.