How long should I hire musicians for?

If you’re like most couples I work with, you have never planned a wedding or large event before.  So finding the right timeline for your musicians can be a bit of a mystery!  I am here to demystify all of your musical timeline questions!

wedding ceremony

If you’re booking musicians for your wedding ceremony as opposed to a Catholic Mass (we’ll get there in a second) you will need to book for one hour.  The musicians begin their performance 30 minutes BEFORE your wedding ceremony actually begins! This is called the prelude, and it happens while your guests are entering into your ceremony space.  The other 30 minutes will be for your actual wedding ceremony.

Catholic mass

If you are having a Catholic Mass, you will need to book for 1.5 hours.  Again, the musicians will begin the prelude 30 minutes BEFORE your ceremony, but this time your ceremony will be closer to one hour.

cocktail hour

Cocktail hour is pretty self-explanatory!  The musicians will be performing for one hour!  Most wedding ceremony/cocktail hour packages are 2 hours: 1 hour for the ceremony and one hour for the cocktail hour directly following the ceremony.  However, if there is any time between your ceremony and cocktail hour, you will need to include that.  If you are having a Catholic Mass in a church and then moving to another location for your reception, you will need the TOTAL time the musicians will be needed.  Start from the prelude, and calculate until the end of the cocktail hour performance and that will be the total time you need to hire the musicians for!

reception 

If you’re booking for a reception or party, just calculate the start and end time of your event (usually 3-4 hours) and that will be the total time to book the musicians for.  You don’t need to worry about setup time! There’s no charge for that 🙂