Wedding dance.

[S. aureus]

I have to come up with some music to get people dancing at a wedding reception, so I figured that I'd turn to the experts at OTF for advice.
Any suggestions? I'll have a crowd largely consisting of Americans in their early forties (give or take).

[erwin]

Wedding dance.

.

There's yer 'Let's Get Married' by Al Green, which is good for smooching and/or close dancing.

.

[G-Man]

Wedding dance.

Do these guests like old skool disco? If so, you might find my Any Major Funk mixes useful.

1. Odyssey - Going Back To My Roots (1981)
2. Cheryl Lynn - Got To Be Real (1978)
3. Raydio - It's Time To Party Now (1980)
4. Billy Ocean - Stay The Night (1980)
5. Shalamar - A Night To Remember (1982)
6. Skyy - Here's To You (1980)
7. One Way feat. Al Hudson - Push (1979)
8. Positive Force - We Got The Funk (1980)
9. Fat Larry's Band - Act Like You Know It (1982)
10. Jimmy 'Bo' Horne - Spank (1978)
11. Sharon Brown - I Specialise In Love (1982)
12. Tom Browne - Funkin' For Jamaica (1980)
13. The Whispers - Let's Go All The Way (1978)
14. Hi Gloss - You'll Never Know (1981)
15. Sister Sledge - He's The Greatest Dancer (1978)
16. Webster Lewis - Give Me Some Emotion (1979)
17. Leon Haywood - Don't Push It, Don't Force It (1980)
18. Rodney Franklin - The Groove (1980)
Bonus tracks:
Instant Funk - I Got My Mind Made Up (1978)
Sunfire - Young, Free And Single (1982) (vinyl rip)

Download link

1. Bell & James - Living It Up (Friday Night) (1978)
2. Jimmy 'Bo' Horne - Dance Across The Floor (1978)
3. Central Line - Walking Into Sunshine (1981)
4. Oliver Cheatham - Get Down Saturday Night (1983)
5. Brenda & the Big Dudes - Weekend Special (1983)
6. The Whispers - And The Beat Goes On (1979)
7. Third World - Dancing On The Floor (Hooked On Love) (1981)
8. Patrice Rushen - Forget Me Nots (1982)
9. The Emotions - Best Of My Love (1978)
10. Hot Cuisine - Who's Been Kissing You (1981)
11. Diana Ross - I'm Coming Out (1980)
12. Chic - My Feet Keep Dancing (1979)
13. Kurtis Blow - The Breaks (long version) (1980)
14. Thelma Houston - Saturday Night (1978)
15. Sister Sledge - Thinking Of You (1979)

Download link

[Mighty Mudhsuden]

Wedding dance.

At my wedding the DJ went straight from our first dance song into "Mr Bojangles" by Sammy Davis Jr, which got everyone who wasn't already dancing (which admittedly wasn't many people) on the floor.

I bumped into him the other day and he says he plays it at every wedding he does now.

[Reed John]

Wedding dance.

Strokin

[S. aureus]

Wedding dance.

Thanks. I've put your mixes on the ipod and will listen to them when I get the chance.
I'm sure that I should know this already, but did you used to be G-man under the old regime?

[G-Man]

Wedding dance.

G-Man is dead, and Pan Tau is the Resurrection.

Actually, I don't want to plug that blog at every opportunity, but you might find some stuff in he Perfect Pop series and other posts (the series on 70sand 80s music, perhaps) which might suit your purposes.

How do you dance to Mr Bojangles? Great song, but I can't choreograph much of a routine in my mind.

[adams house cat]

Wedding dance.

Boogie Wonderland - E.W. & F.
Disco Inferno - Trampps
allways got the crowd going when I did weddings at the winery.

Also the Brian Setzer Orchestra were popular esp. 'The Dirty Boogis' and 'Jump, Jive and Wail'

[Crusoe]

Wedding dance.

Have you had the wedding yet, s.? Which songs worked well?

I'm putting together some suggestions for the DJ for my own wedding (not really a detailed list - he's the pro after all - but some songs we'd like and some ideas on what we don't want).

[Gangster Octopus]

Wedding dance.

.RARs, G, how?

[Crusoe]

Wedding dance.

.RAR files? You'll need WinRAR. The only free alternative that springs to mind is 7zip (http://www.7-zip.org/) which I think can uncompress these files.

[G-Man]

Wedding dance.

WinRar is free, basically. You must pay for the professional version, but I've never seen any need to upgrade.

Get it HERE. It's piss-easy to use.

[S. aureus]

Wedding dance.

The wedding's on the 17th.
I'll report back afterwards.

[S. aureus]

Wedding dance.

I'm afraid that I don't have much to report on what gets people to dance. Either that or I screwed it up really, really badly.
I prefer, however, to blame the heatwave that we in the Bay Area experienced at the end of last week. The hall where the dancing was supposed to take place was wickedly hot, not having ac or anything, so I think people preferred to relax outside (where it was cooler by that time of night) than sweat profusely. Or so I'd like to think, since everyone fled the dance floor once the obligatory first dance was over, and nothing lured them back in again. The drinks were outside, also.
Thanks for the advice anyway.

[Gerontophile]

Wedding dance.

yes, but be honest, was the music that you played, good? Their loss etc, and possibly the fact that you didnt have a far reaching sound system.

[Gerontophile]

Wedding dance.

and of course 'Lets Get Married' by the Proclaimers... although I can guess which will go down better (Proclaimers)