Dancing Necessary?

I mostly like this idea - some common overlay with my wedding: destination at a resort and ends at 9 as well. I felt like this was super early [for my crowd] and have invited all the guests to come have drinks with us after, so definitely don't think that is tacky.

However, if you don't want a dancefloor/DJ, I still think you should provide music. 6-9PM is only an hour short of a normal reception - if you were doing a cocktail hour only, or maybe even a 2-hour reception, I'd say you could completely forgo it.

Some people have planned games for reception because they were not interested in dancing. I forget what games were mentioned, if any. So it depends on the crowd -- but it sounds like your guests wouldn't broadly be interested in the dancing. It is fine to work with other ideas to keep people occupied during that time -- even if it is just socializing.

I think this is a "know your crowd" type of thing. My fiancé and I LOVE dancing at weddings, but some people aren't super into it. If it's not something your crowd will miss, then I think it's fine to skip out on dancing.

I was just thinking that even for some of us not much into dancing that the simple fact of others having fun dancing can make the mood more celebratory. This is the idea that if others are having fun, the reception must be great overall.

If you are planning to have some music (live or taped) at your cocktail reception, perhaps some of it could be dance music. Depending on the age range of your guests, you might have "Big Band" music, 50's or 60's "Oldies", 70's "Disco" or just some soft music for slow dancing. Dancing would be entirely optional and if one or two couple begin dancing, perhaps others will dance as well. Or it could just be one or two couples, or just you and your bridegroom if you have a special "Our Song".