Questions/prep for meeting Dj?

We have a list of a few songs that we absolutely don’t want played so that might be worth thinking about. Nothing worse than music being played that you can’t stand (top of our list is the Cha Cha Slide - it drives me crazy!).

I have shot weddings where the couple have had a very unique music taste but no one was on the dance floor - not even them as they were busy chatting to guests or saying good-buy to Gran.

So other than the key moments its probably best to let the DJ do their "thing" and read the room to keep the floor filled. I have to confess I do like those set dance routines like cha cha slide as they are easy to shoot ! and look good in photos.

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That's good to know! We're quite happy with a cheesy wedding classic tbh - but we're quite old school in our music taste, so would rather those retro classics that everyone knows (Fleetwood Mac, David Bowie, Stevie Wonder, etc) or 90s/00s throwbacks to school discos, rather than whatever Beyonce or Ariana Grande's currently put out because then we wouldn't know the song ourselves haha

We listen to a lot of Radio Gold and Absolute - so wondering about mentioning that so we don't wind up with a Radio 1 club mix vibe?

Or is that all too prescriptive?

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That's a good idea!! My least favourite song of all time is Bleeding Love by Leona Lewis haha

From my experience those retro classics that everyone knows are what is mostly played. But DJs sometimes will do sections of era's like 60s perhaps but don't really recall any Radio 1 club mix type stuff.

I am sure that your DJ will appreciate some sort of guidance - say exactly what you have said on here.

We had a list of NOT to be played and then gave a list of a few must haves but basically said to play what he knows will get people dancing and to read the room. It is their craft and they know what works and what doesn't. we have some fave songs but didn't play them as they were not songs that people would dance to. He mainly played the typical wedding classics and a few random ones!

To add to the above I would also mention how vocal you want them to be. If you hate DJs that use the microphone to motivate people to dance or talk in the middle of songs then you may want to raise that now.

As he's provided by your venue, see if he can give you more helpful information in general about the venue, your wedding package etc! It's kind of hard to explain what I mean, as obviously you would already have information about your venue, but the DJ may be able to give a different perspective or insight. Our DJ is also included in our package and when he scheduled an hour long videocall I wondered what we could possibly talk about for an hour, but we actually overran by 20 minutes because he was providing a really interesting perspective on all the weddings he's done at our venue and elements of our package that haven't been focussed on as much yet (e.g. our toastmaster).

Maybe ask for recommendations to play right after the first dance (and any other dances) to get everyone on the dancefloor straight away? Important if your photographer will still be there for a short while more and you want some dancefloor photos! Our DJ was explaining that if you go way too cheesy too soon it will be a dancefloor killer.

He also mentioned that if there are some less dancey songs we want played he will play them at a time it won't really affect the dancing as much e.g. when the buffet comes out. Most of our reception will be the expected wedding reception music (I'm a big fan of the 80s haha) which should get people up dancing, but it's good to know that we can fit in the odd alternative song if we want.

When we met with ours he just wanted to get to know us a little bit, and an idea about timings and if we wanted him to play background music at the wedding breakfast.

We asked him about if he wanted us to provide food, and confirmed a few details about setup (he’s also our venue’s recommended do so we pretty much just said to do what he normally does).

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Oh I hadn't even thought the DJ talking! No idea whether I like that or not haha - I'll have a think!!

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Oooh that's really interesting and such a good point that he's probably a goldmine of venue knowledge! This is so helpful, thank you

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I'm thinking about this part of planning for a party and that's very very good advice - thank you!