You’d like your wedding ceremony to be filled with joy and drama-free, right?
Here’s a wedding music tip for you that could help prevent an awkward or even possibly disastrous ceremony. If you’re using an amateur musician in your ceremony, think about this.
Anyone can be nervous
Almost everyone can get nervous before a big event. Athletes, performers, speakers can all suffer from being nervous. Even you, before your wedding ceremony will probably be nervous! It takes determination to get through it.
Professional musicians can also be affected, so amateur musicians can be affected even more so. And since amateurs usually don’t have the training or experience that professionals do to help overcome it, nervousness can lead to big problems.
A friend or family-member musician may be extra nervous because of their relationship to you and may put extra pressure on themselves.
You want to do whatever possible to put your amateur musicians at ease.
A tip to help put nervous musicians at ease
If you think this could be a concern (and you can usually figure it out from their situation), you want to make sure that you don’t have a ceremony marred by a musician struggling to get through a piece of music.
So here’s my tip: Invite the amateur musician to your wedding rehearsal and have them play or sing there.
This will help them get comfortable with the surroundings. It gives them an audience, helping them feel more at ease and boosting their confidence.
Even if their part of the ceremony isn’t a significant part of the rehearsal, you can still have them play or sing while another part is rehearsed.
For example, have a vocal soloist sing while you’re rehearsing something else, such as the processional (if your processional musician isn’t there or doesn’t specifically need to rehearse their part). You might need to make sure the accompanist is present (who might already be present). But this is a small detail compared to the pain or awkwardness of a difficult performance during the ceremony.
Trust me, your heart will go out to your friend or relative if they start struggling.
Not using amateur musicians isn’t the answer
Some churches or pro musicians will just suggest the solution of not using amateur musicians. Instead, I suggest just doing all you can to make their contribution to your joy-filled day a little easier!
What do you think?
What other tips do you have for helping a nervous musician? What experiences have you had with nervous musicians (including if you’ve been one yourself!)? Leave your thoughts below!
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