Ceremony and Cocktail Hour at Water’s Edge in LIC

May 3rd, 2013

What a beautiful venue! We have played here several times now, and it never disappoints. How could it, with that view!!! I even managed to snap a skyline pic on our way out in the evening.

As far as the ceremony, we debuted another custom arrangement, this time of a Mumford & Sons song, ‘Lovers’ Eyes’. It was a perfect song, very fitting for the processional before the bride walked to ‘Falling Slowly’. Another first-time tune for Penguin was the recessional, which was Gershwin’s ‘Our Love is Here to Stay’.

For the cocktail hour, we kept the jazz vibe going and played several swinging jazz numbers, some Bossa, and generally just kept the party going. Check out the pics to see the great views of the Skyline to see why Water’s Edge is a no-brainer for a beautiful setting within the city.

April 27th

A beautiful and unique setting for a ceremony in the park, the Oriental Pavilion was the perfect spot for this wedding. At this hip Brooklyn wedding, where they brought in old antique couches for seating, the song ‘Santa Clara’ by the National was a great selection for the recessional.

The wedding was very much a product of this couples unique love for each other and also their individuality. It was amazing to be a part of it. Other Penguin selections included ‘Married Life’ from the movie ‘Up’, as well as some Beatles selections (Here Comes the Sun, Blackbird, etc).

It was a gorgeous day and a gorgeous event, as it was the same day of the Cherry Blossom Festival at Brooklyn Botanical Gardens…the only thing that WASN’T beautiful was the traffic! Penguin Music resides in Brooklyn and lives close to the park, so it was a good thing we are veterans of Prospect Park and the Cherry Blossom Festival, enough to know that it was going to be CRAZY! We got there with plenty of time and had a nice, relaxing afternoon in the park playing some beautiful and fun music…

In fact, we were having such a good time, we forgot to take pictures! Whoops!!

April 20th, 2013

This was Penguin Music’s first wedding of the season, and the weather really cooperated! It was one of the first weekends of the year that the Botanical Gardens were lively, and it was a great setting for this wedding.

The bride entered to Brandi Carlile’s ‘The Story’, which was a new one for us. Glad to add it to our repertoire! Also really fun was the recessional ‘Higher and Higher’ by Jackie Wilson, which was a lively and extended version!

This Last weekend we had the pleasure of playing on a beautiful Tribeca Rooftop on 2 Debrosses Street. This roof was amazing, as were the views of the city! As you can see, the new construction of the Freedom Tower stands tall in the background! Breathtaking…

As far as the ceremony itself, there was quite a bit of traditional Jewish music in the ceremony, which Steven and I always enjoy playing. This included Dodi Li, Simon Tov, and Erev Shel Shoshanim. You can hear the recording coming soon to this post. We had a great time playing this beautiful ceremony, although the wind gave us a run for our money with our music and our microphones!!

On September 15th, we played a beautiful wedding at an amazing venue, The Bedford Post Inn, in Bedford NY. (http://www.bedfordpostinn.com/) This place is absolutely gorgeous, and a fantastic place for this beautiful yet understated wedding. Check out the pic of the  lab! He was the ring bearer…

The couple chose to have Penguin Wedding Music basically curate the whole evening of music – we played prelude music as guests arrived, then did a cocktail hour in the beautiful outdoor garden/pool area, finally moving inside to set up and play during dinner. WE made sure to cater towards their style, which was laid back and fun, doing lots of pop and rock covers throughout the night. It was a great night with a fabulous group of people…truly a pleasure!

Last weekend we had the pleasure of returning to the lovely venue in Long Island City, The Foundry (http://www.thefoundry.info/) This is a great spot that should definitely be a consideration for any couple looking at getting married in the NYC area. They have indoor AND outdoor portions to the venue and everything seems very well organized. Penguin Wedding Music was hired for their ceremony, and although it was VERY windy (my stand actually almost blew over during the prelude music!) we were able to help them make their day special. One of the tracks that they requested specially from Penguin Wedding Music was a cello and guitar rendition of Purcell’s Rondeau. Listen to a snippet of the recording below!

Air On G

Also, while the picture I took of Steven warming up doesn’t quite do the space justice, you can see that they have a beautiful outdoor area perfect for a ceremony.

We have already talked about the beautiful wedding at the Sagamore resort. Here is a great video by Jeffrey Holland from the wedding. You can see us for a few seconds at 2:01

Shanna + Scott :: Wedding SDE at The Sagamore from FFDC :: Jeffrey Holland on Vimeo.

We all hope that it will never rain on our wedding day, but it is important to have a back up plan if it does! This weekend we were set to play music for a wedding ceremony at the beautiful Ladies Pavilion in Central Park.

The rain started at 9AM and did not end until the evening. Unfortunately for the lovely couple coming all the way from the U.K., meant the ceremony had to be moved indoors.  Fortunately the wedding coordinator, Orysia Germak from Tourism Marketing Inc, had a beautiful back up plan at the All Souls Church on Lexington where we were able to play Falling Slowly, Iris (Goo Goo Dolls) and All You Need is Love for the ceremony!

This wedding was several weeks ago, on June 30th, at the Sagamore in Bolton Landing near Lake George. It was quite a drive out of the city, but well worth the travel! It was a good thing that we knew most of our music by heart for this gig because the wind was gusting so hard that it was blowing our stands over – we actually just ended up playing from memory for most of the time! Here Comes the Sun, by the Beatles, worked great for this processional, but I think people had heard enough by the time the bride was ready to walk – the ‘aisle’ was probably close to 1,000 feet long!!!

Check out some more pics on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Penguin-Wedding-Music/126066410817506#!/pages/Penguin-Wedding-Music/126066410817506

We’re BACK! To Mymoon, that is, for the second time in about a month!

For this weekend’s wedding, we played a new custom arrangement (you can get as many as 2 as part of our typical wedding package) of ‘Sugar Magnolia’, by the Grateful Dead. This was a great song for the recessional because it is very happy and uptempo.

The wedding was great for the lovely couple, Sarah and Kevin, and Mymoon was decorated beautifully inside and out, as you can see below. The interesting decorations that are there year-round make for a great base to work from to make your wedding unique and beautiful.