Ian Stewart Blog

This wedding was one that I had been preparing for for some time, I had been booked as part of the wedidng package by the venue, but had met the bride & her mother at a reent open day at the venue, and really got on well with them, and we discussed the possibility of me acting as MC / Toastmaster for the day, as although it was not a "Jewish Wedding" the bride was Jewish.

Now the day came, and there was quite a lot for me to do, they had booked the light curtain for behind the top table, and also the LED Uplighters fopr around the room, as well as a projector and screen for the best man's speach, so it was all hand to the pump with Sharon, Murray and myself making sure everything was in place, we were held up a little by the chair company taking nearly 4 hours to put the covers on the chairs (and there were 4 of them), but all was done, then it was a drive home to have some lunch, and watch the football.

I arrived back at the venue in plenty of time, as I had been discussing with the father of the bride some music that was needed to be played as the happy couple entered the room, with some tradittional Jewish dancing before the meal, which was done, with everyone in the room joining in.

Then the meal, followed by the toasts, and then immediatly into the dancing, and boy did they dance all night, what a fantastic wedding disco it was.

below is the music that they chose for the event:

1st Dance Amazed Lonestar
2nd Dance isn't she lovely stevie wonder
3rd Dance like a star neyo
Cutting Of The Cake a million love songs take that
Last Dance (I've Had) The Time Of My Life Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes

all were played plus a mix of 70's & 80s classics, and as the bride requested some quality R&B

www.ian-stewart.co.uk

Just for a change, I was booked to supply the disco for a joint 60th birthday party at the Orwell Park School in Ipswich.

but before that, I went to see the greatest football team in world, namely Southend United who were playing their nearest neighbours Colchester United, wow what an exciting game finishing 3-3.

unusually for me, at The Orwell park School, they do not require me to arrive at the venue, until one hours befor mr start time, so I left home a little later then usual 7pm, and drove to Ipswich in the pouring rain, and the roads were very very bad, luckily enough, when I unloaded the equipment from the van, the rain had subsided alot.

I had all the equipment set by 9.00pm, and the staff at the venue were lovely and gave us our dinner, and allowed us to sit in the staff room until the clients had finished their dinner, which did over run quite a bit, and instead of a 10pm start, I started at 10.45pm, and went straight into the dancing, with a full floor right up until the end of the night.

As with most of my clients they had completed their music list online, here is what they chose for their birthday party disco:

1 Must Play Dancing Queen Abba
2 Must Play Waterloo Abba
3 Must Play More than a woman Bee Gees
4 Must Play Stayin' Alive Bee Gees
5 Must Play (I've Had) The Time Of My Life Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes
6 Must Play Lady in Red Chris de Burgh
7 Must Play Dancing in the Street David Bowie & Mick Jagger
8 Must Play Walk of Life Dire Straits
9 Must Play American Pie Don Mclean
10 Must Play Mercy (Album Mix) Duffy
11 Must Play Hero Enrique Iglasias
12 Must Play Sweet Dreams Eurythmics
13 Must Play Moving on up M People
14 Must Play I heard it through the grapevine Marvin Gaye
15 Must Play I'm In The Mood For Dancing Nolans
16 Must Play Another day in Paradise Phil Collins
17 Must Play Sussudio Phil Collins
18 Must Play Whiter Shade of Pale Procol Harem
19 Must Play We will rock you Queen
20 Must Play Don't Stop Me Now Queen
21 Must Play Let me entertain you Robbie Williams
22 Must Play Maggie May Rod Stewart
23 Must Play Paint it Black Rolling Stones
24 Must Play Get Off of My Cloud Rolling Stones
25 Must Play We Are Family Sister Sledge
26 Must Play Keep on running Spencer Davis Group
27 Must Play Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours Stevie Wonder
28 Must Play I love to Boogie T Rex
29 Must Play Substitute The Who
30 Must Play It's Raining Men Weather Girls
31 Play If Possible Yes Merry Clayton Dirty Dancing
32 Play If Possible Fields of Gold Robbie Williams
33 Play If Possible Paint it Black Rolling Stones

www.ian-stewart.co.uk

Well I almost managed to keep my promise, who am I kidding well it looks like I need to do a couple of days at a time until I catch up.

Friday 31st October 2008 I was DJ for the wedding of Claire Palmer & Robert Parrott in the Banqueting Suite at Stock Brook Manor, Billericay, as always for Mobile Disco's at Stock Brook Manor, I arrived at the venue at 10am, so that I could set all my disco equipment up nice and early, so that there was no disruption to the wedding breakfast at all.

As always the planning was done online, and they had chosen the following music that they wanted me to play:

The main songs requested were

1st Dance Footprints In the Sand - Leona Lewis
2nd Dance She's the One - Robbie Williams
3rd Dance Waterloo - Abba
Last Dance Rule the World (Radio) - Take That

and they also asked if I could play the following Requests
1 Footloose - Kenny Loggins for the groom Rob Parrott, who's a secret Footloose fan!
2 I wanna dance with somebody - Whitney Houston For Norman, who's a big Whitney fan!
3 mamma mia - abba
4 (I've Had) The Time Of My Life Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes
5 Valerie - Mark Ronson & Amy Winehouse
6 Billie Jean - Michael Jackson History
7 Brown eyed girl - Van Morrison
8 Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go - Wham! Video
9 Take on me - A-ha
10 fascination - alphabeat
11 Let Me Be Your Fantasy - Baby D
12 When the going gets tough.... - Billy Ocean
13 Livin' on a prayer - Bon Jovi
14 Summer of 69 - Bryan Adams
15 Build me up buttercup - foundations
16 Jump (For My Love) - Girls Aloud
17 Don't You Want Me Baby - Human League
18 Can't Get You Out of My Head - Kylie Minogue
19 Fame - Irene Cara
20 Flashdance (What a Feeling) - Irene Cara
21 Spinning Around - Kylie Minogue
22 Like a prayer - Madonna
23 (I'm Gonna Be) 500 Miles - Proclaimers
24 Rock DJ - Robbie Williams
25 Let me entertain you - Robbie Williams
26 Mr. Bojangles - Robbie Williams
27 I Don't Feel Like Dancin' - Scissor Sisters
28 Sweet Like Chocolate - Shanks & Bigfoot
29 We are family - sister sledge
30 Music Sounds Better with You - Stardust
31 It only takes a minute - Take That
32 Relight My Fire - Take That & Lulu
33 I think we're alone now - Tiffany
34 YMCA - Village People

www.ian-stewart.co.uk

at the beginning of the month, I thought this was going to be one of the quieter ones, but with a few last minute bookings, and a few conferances I ended up with 15 gigs.

Now the weekending Sunday 28th September was quite busy with me providing the Audio & Visual requirements for 3 conferances on the Wednesday & Thursday, so on these days it was an early rise (5am to be precise) and a quick arrival at the venue to set up sound systems, wireless microphones and projectors.

On the Friday I had decided to take the night off to go see the greatest football team in the world, Southend United beat those cockney boys Orient, and I was not disapointed, with a 3-0 thrashing handed out, then it was off home to pick up the van to collect Murray, who was DJ'ing at Stock Brook Manor.

Now Saturday was a completly differant thing, there was a conferance for the "Pre-School Alliance" in the banqueting Suite at Stock Brook Manor. I had to have 3 wireless radio microphones, 4 speakers, a projector and laptop set up by 9am.

then it was a quick break as I was providing the disco & auctioneering for another charity ball in the Club House at stock brook manor, I had aslo been asked to set up additional speakers, and also connect all the TV's in the room to my system, so that we could play jpg's and a video mesage from Leonna Lewis.

and wow what a fantastic night, where I helped raise £1,000's of pounds, the highlight of the evening was a meet & greet with Soul Star Lemar, who was guest of honour at the dinner

Sunday was another early rise as Sharon & I were attending a wedding fayre at the Towngate Theatre Basildon, a day to meet as many prospective bride & grooms as possible, and try to get them to book me a the disco for their wedding reception, a very busy day with lots of people in attendance, I gave out a record amont of business cards, and so have have taken 7 bookings for the disco, LED uplighters & fairy light curtain.

Now gigging wise, this has been one of my quietest weeks for a long time, with just the one gig.

Saturday night, I was booked to provide the disco and also do the auction at a charity ball at Stock Brook Manor in Billericay Essex, they charity had also booked my wife Sharon to sing for an hour.

we arrived at the venue in plenty of time, so that we could set up the disco, also wire Sharon's reverb and mini disc player into my system, so that Sharon could sing using my equipment, that way only one system would be needed and the room looked a lot more tidy. I also had to install a couple of extra speakers into the main part of the room, so that everyone could hear the bids etc for the auction.

We were set in plenty of time, and had a quick run through the running order with the two girls organising the evening, so the meal started with a small introduction from Lisa, one of the organisors, a little bit of house keeping, about the raffle, heads & tails and auction.

and what a marvelous night it was, a great game of heads & tails, then the raffle, followed by a great auction the high light being a £1,000 for a dinner for 10 at Ingatestone Hall, and the surprise being the £290 for a signed Chelmsford City Ball, I thought it would be a struggle, so devised a differant auction game to get the most out of the item.

Once the room was ready we started the dancing, and between Sharon & I we had the dancefloor full all night with some great music played as well.

Once the evening was over we'd managed to raise over £5,000 on the night

GOOD LUCK GIRLS with your walk accross Brazil