Last Friday the 9th of July I Hosted a Great Party , The Dance floor was full when the party started.
This wasn't a lucky accident but down to planning as you will soon discover.
I got a call from a really nice guy who is a Captain of a golf club whose normal DJ couldn't help him on this occasion. It was fairly short notice but i suggested we meet up and discuss what he had in mind.
So armed with sat nav , I saddled up in my trusty estate car and went to Mellor golf club , it was a lovely sunny and hot day. I had never been to Mellor before but was really glad to visit this beautiful part of the country.
I am not a Golfer but watch the occasional match on the telly but even i was blown away at how beautiful this course is , the club house is overlooking the final green and you get a great view of matches from an awesome balcony view point.
I mentioned the Captains name and the doors opened to the club and on this very hot day i was pleased to meet the captain and his lovely wife at the bar , an ice cold coke went down a treat!
so we had a chat about what the event was "Captains day" is a informal day to celebrate the Captain , Now he and his wife had some brilliant song suggestions , that they wanted played on the evening and i wrote these down on my consultation form , this is a little form i have devised that i fill in so i know all the details like peoples names , the venues contacts , start and finish times , lighting requirements , venue access times etc .
Finding out these details rather than just turning up on the night means a smoother more professional show , I try to leave nothing to chance, because of this we then went to visit the actual room that would be used on the night.
A lovely , well sized room , with a large dance floor , I took note of the , power socket position the fire exits the height of the ceilings , loading access and nearest toilets (not for myself but its amazing how many guest ask the DJ where the loo is!)
I don't smoke myself but i noted where the smoking areas were again for if i was asked by guests.
So I gathered all the information I needed and normally i leave and post a quotation but they were happy with seeing me and noticed how I do business that they paid a reservation fee to confirm the booking after I gave them a verbal quotation.
On the day of the event unfortunately it was not the glorious sunshine of the free consultation visit but a muggy sunshine thundery day , but this did not put a dampener for me and i enthusiastically set off for an early set up.
For their party they wanted a good light show but not something that was overly fast and "in your eyes" so I used four LED par cans these give a wash of colour , these cans are connected together and synchronised to give the same colour of many available different colours in time to the beat of the music. I also used two LED scanners and a gobo moonflower effect.
I arrived early and set up my equipment. I then went back home to get showered and changed.
At the start of the evening i was just playing background music as speeches were taking place in the other room.
Some ladies from the party came into the function room and sat down easily being able to talk and catch up to low level back ground music. I was watching to see reactions to this back ground music and through my experience of reading crowds this would prove useful for later on in the evening. I could see feet tapping and singing along to quiet background music so i knew certain tracks would hit the spot later on when the party started.
The speeches over ran a little so when they all came into the party room , i soon got into , lets get started party mode. I knew that some people would like to dance so early on so a little Motown soon got a few on the floor , I could tell some were great dancers and so i switched on instinct to songs they could Jive to , well the floor filled and they were all Jiving away to rock and roll and sixties and even wham's wake me up before you go go. Many of the older guests were about to leave the dance floor at the end of a song but as soon as they heard the next track they couldn't and kept on dancing, Some had to give up as jiving that good for so long is tiring for professional dancers but after a short rest they were often back up.
The function manager came up and asked me to announce the buffet was served in the other room , so i did so , some stayed dancing but the allure of the lovely smelling food was enough for many so , I had to kick start the party once again after the buffet was cleared , I took inspiration from the captains and his wife's playlist and a bit of Blondie,The human league and Bowie soon got the floor packed again on the play list was a few from the blues brothers and The Commitments
Later on I started to mix in current music tracks and the younger and older guests loved these The Black eyed peas and Ne-Yo kept them dancing all night , unfortunately we had to finish as we ran out of time and we finished with the captain in a circle surrounded by his lovely friends family and colleagues.
For me the best part of the evening was when the captain came and shook my hand said what a great time it was and how he would recommend me.
I am only happy when i know i have done a good job and that people had a very good time . as people were leaving as i was packing away i got lots of thank you and thumbs up.
Here are a few more pictures of full dance floors
So I Hope you like the first of my new Blogs
