Your Wedding

As an experienced wedding band, the Taverners will personalise the music and dancing at your reception to maximise the enjoyment of all ages. We offer:

· Music as your guests arrive

If you would like some live background music prior to the wedding feast, we can offer our popular keyboard duo who play a selection of easy to listen to music covering differing styles. They are unobtrusive but provide a gentle background to guests who are waiting for all of the wedding party to finally arrive. Over welcoming drinks, what better than to listen to recognisable tunes from the worlds of dance bands, jazz, latin, shows and gentle pop tunes. For a comprehensive list of the music that is on offer, please contact us for current our play list.

· Choice of Wedding song

Yes, we know you might not want to dance alone in front of all the other guests – but it is traditional and we can make it as painless, or as joyous as possible. If you have a slow romantic song that is “our” song, or you would like some suggestions, we can give you a wide choice. Usually, after about 30 seconds we invite other guests onto the floor, starting with close relatives and best man, bridesmaids, etc. You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to! It is your wedding!

· The Band

We offer a band made up with experienced musicians who double up on a variety of instruments. Our usual line up consists of our singer/caller/guitarist, fiddle/banjo, fiddle/guitar/ brass/flute/mandolin (yes, he plays them all) and keyboards which also provide the rhythms.

· Caller and trad barn/ceilidh dances

As, in part of our other life, we are well known for our barn dances and Irish music, we find that these are a really good way of getting people onto the floor, particularly if they don’t know each other very well. By the way, ceilidh is an Irish word that everybody spells differently, but it usually stands for singing and dancing. We are also able to offer a Scottish flavour to the dances as one of the members of our band spent three years playing in a Scottish band in Edinburgh, until they found out he was English!

Our caller will call some fairly easy dances and teach people how to do them through a mixture of humour, coercion and dire threats!

· Strictly Ballroom

There was a time when receptions consisted of quicksteps, waltzes, foxtrots, cha cha and other traditional dances – those were the days.. but I digress. However, we can do all of these styles if necessary and we do often get requests. Again a few included in the overall mixture can be fun and are quite popular with older relatives or those who admit to going to dance evening classes!

· 60/70s hits

The maxim that if you can remember the sixties – you can’t have been there is untrue. We were there and we did play the music at the time it was being written, so there!

We still find that the real hit dances from those times get people onto the floor quicker than anything else, and it does give people the chance to sing along as well.

· Slow romantic songs

We’ve got a large selection, leave them to us!

· Songs and background music

We know that people are not going to want to dance all the time. We also know that people don’t want loud music blaring in their ears while they are trying to catch up on old times. To cater for this, we will play and sing songs in between the dances to keep the momentum of the evening going.

· Disco Music

Sorry, we are a live band, well some of us are. If you want a disco, get a DJ!

Although- our caller does a bit of moonlighting as a DJ and he could end the evening off if you are absolutely desperate.

· Other needs

We quite often include some quirky dances to end the evening with a bang or even a whimper. Things like – Zorba the Greek, Hokey cokey (God forbid) and the Sussex Wedding dance, spring to mind. It will depend on the state of the evening ,,,,, trust our judgement on this.

· Humour

Yes we aim to have fun and we will tell a few jokes, but with a sense of decorum. We promise not to upset anybody, except the bride and groom…..only kidding.

· The band

We only use highly polished and dedicated musicians, all experienced at playing at such functions through years of playing together and copious quantities of drink. Up to date ..ish sound systems enhance the sound and volume to cater for all sizes of dance venues.

· Finally

If you have any other queries don’t hesitate to contact us, however late in the day. If you do book us, we will send you a contract for your assurance and we want you to feel that you can relax for the evening, with all of the entertainment safely in our hands.

For bookings or further enquiries, contact Geoff Goater ON 01444 457531 or email Gsmikey@aol.com