Confused about what kind of musicians to hire? Have no idea what songs are good for a wedding ceremony? A lot depends upon where your wedding ceremony is being held—-churches often have restrictions on the kinds of music you can have. In this module, we explore all your options, and give you lists of traditional and contemporary songs to use in your wedding ceremony.
The following article is an example of the content we have in our online wedding planning membership site HappyWeddings.ca under the heading of Ceremony Musicians. To learn more and get useful wedding planning tools for FREE, click here!
Ceremony musicians come in many forms. If you belong to a house of worship, you will have ready access to an organist, choir, brass band, or any other musical group that regularly performs at your place of worship. If you don’t belong to a house of worship, you have the option of joining one (many people do) to get discounts on costs, and access to musicians. But, not to worry—there are many ways to access musicians that don’t involve a house of worship.
As with all things along your wedding path, you have many options at this stage also. The most common options are: organist, soloist, violinist, and pianist. More extravagant choices include a trio or quartet of classical musicians, a brass band, or a worship band.
The first thing you need to know is if there are any restrictions on the type of music played at your ceremony site. A house of worship may or may not restrict musical choices, and you need to know that to plan this part of your wedding.
Your hired musicians or DJ will have music selections for you to choose from, but you might also want to choose your own special songs for key parts of your ceremony. If you have talented friends or family who are musicians, you can ask them to be part of your wedding ceremony by performing.
The next topic will get into more details of the music selection.