One of my favorite traditions at a wedding is when the couple makes special gifts to leave on the table as souvenirs for their guests. These can range anywhere from mints or sweets to little cameras to take pictures for the bride and groom, but my absolute favorite gift is from a wedding I attended a few years ago. At the reception the couple left a CD on the table in front of every guest’s place setting which they had printed an adorable picture of themselves kissing on the front. The picture was cute but the really great thing about this CD was the amazing play list burned onto it.
The couple had decided to skip all the traditional wedding music and use their own choices during the ceremony, opting to replace the Wedding March with Government Mule’s Soulshine and peppering in the Beatles and Led Zeppelin during certain parts of the event for effect. Adding their personal touch to the music made the ceremony not only beautiful but entertaining. Once the reception started the originality of the music choices continued including Bob Marley for the first dance and Pink Floyd for the “money” dance. All around the music at both events was perfect and very crowd pleasing, but what really pleased the crowd was the fact that we all got our own copy of the play list to take home. I listened to that CD for weeks straight and still continue to enjoy it, each time being reminded of my friends and how joyous that day was for them.
This idea is a modern and exciting gift that would make a nice addition to any reception. As a bride or groom it is likely that you will already spend a good amount of time deciding on music already so following it through to the “mixed tape” phase will only take a few more steps. If you are using traditional wedding music during the ceremony you can still fill the reception with beautiful and fun music that your guests will enjoy and love listening to for a long time. No real parameters exist for this mix accept to keep it true to the theme of you and your relationship. Happy and joyous songs are great but it does not have to be all sappy love songs. If you really spend some time and think outside the box a little, you too can leave your wedding guests with a souvenir they will cherish that will always remind them of the happiest day of your life.
