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Dedicated July 2018

Open mic for speeches?

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Samantha, on June 28, 2018 at 7:20 AM

My DJ strongly advised against opening the mic for speeches for everyone. Hes been a dj for 20+ years and says hes seen it get too long and sometimes inappropriate if you don't control who can do a speech. I'm very quiet and don't speak my mind often and I can understand where hes coming from. As it...

I'm very quiet and don't speak my mind often and I can understand where hes coming from. As it stands we only have best man, maid of honor and ffil giving a speech which is fine. But I feel like if someone wants to speak up and say something, they should be able to... Do I tell my DJ I want anyone to be able to or leave it the way it is?

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Devoted October 2018
Caitlin · on July 3, 2018 at 7:00 AM
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My friend didn't have a DJ but had a friend MC. He let anyone speak and it was the most awkward thing ever. Don't do it. Trust that a DJ with that much experience knows what he's doing.
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Beginner November 2011
Peter · on July 8, 2018 at 9:18 PM
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I am a DJ and I completely 100% agree with your DJ. Trust your DJ and the advice he provides. If he has been working in the biz for 20 years, he has probably played a role in planning a great many more weddings than you have. He's probably seen every possible thing that could possibly go wrong at a wedding, and he knows what needs to be done to prevent such problems from recurring.
This is why you hired an experienced professional, instead of asking some acquaintenance's teenage cousin to hook up their iPhone and a Radio Shack mic to a spare home theater system for $200. Put your DJ money to good use and trust his experience-based advice.
An open mic may seem like a friendly gesture, but it's really a bad idea. Some people really are good at public speaking, but many more *think* they are good at public speaking. (They don't call booze "liquid courage" for nothing!) I've had weddings where the bride and groom allowed a last-minute addition to the speaker list, and it's always someone who asked them minutes earlier, they caved in, and the relative/friend then proceeded to ramble on for 15-20 minutes with boring stories that had no point or purpose, often nothing at all to do with the newlyweds or even marriage in general. Or once when an uncle just talked about the groom's childhood for what seemed like an eternity, but again, nothing to do with the bride or how all of these random memories related to the current event at hand.
Best to keep the toast list limited to just the BM, MOH, and one or two parents, period. Since they know they'll be speaking, they'll have remarks prepared ahead of time, so you know their speeches will be on-point and hopefully of a reasonable length (5 minutes or less).

If you want everyone at the wedding to have a chance to share some words of advice, that's what guestbooks (or similar concepts) are for.
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