No formalities except a cake cutting and first dance… this was 6 hours of pure party!

Sounds exhausting? Not really… thanks to the amazing Orlando Wedding Team, headlined by Allison, Francesca, and Laura. They were great to work with. As for food… the Lake Nona Country Club has to be the best in the area; Lobster Ravioli, cheese ravioli, sushi, and Asian-spiced prime rib filled me up and left me craving more by the day’s end.

JR Sterling and Perfect Sky Productions shot photos and video… and these guys are a blast to work with! I’ll be sure to post a link to their blogs!

So yes, check out the photos and HD video (thank you, iPhone 4) below.

And the video! To watch it in HD, click here: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=412530994287&ref=mf

This was my second year performing for the Heartland Realtors and they are such an amazing group! Don and I cracked jokes on each other on and off the mic and he left them hyped up enough that they were ready to dance.

Last year was all about 80s and rock… this year they loved 90s dance and Top40. It got so intense they everyone popped the balloons to pull out the flashing LEDs. As soon as that happened, all the lights were shut off and a rave came into play!

Check out the photos and video below!

With the Courtyard at Lake Lucerne as their location, Claudia and Billy wanted a very special evening. Thank God the Florida humidity died down for this one, otherwise we’d have different results. What started out as a quiet evening inside the house ended up as a crazy party with two dance floors. The second floor formed BEHIND the speakers, where no one could tell any different in the sound, thanks to BOSE’s amazing acoustics.

With only 3 Indian guests there, we expected minimal requests for Hindi music (we talked about this with Claudia and Billy and they even requested some Bhangra). However after playing Punjabi MC and watching the floor go WILD we dropped a couple other Bhangra artists including Jazzy B and the crowd became even more intense. Mixing it into some Bollywood, starting with Jai Ho REMIX really sent them over the edge.

Of course, being Dominican, Claudia wanted lots of Salsa and Merengue. Billy wanted to make sure no “wedding music” was played and that this was a chic, styling, and modern wedding. Sandra Johnson (http://www.sjfoto.com) and her team did an amazing job and I can’t wait to see their amazing photography work!!

Check out the video and photos.. I think we achieved that goal!

I’ll brag here and say they were SO happy they wrote on our WeddingWire right after the wedding. With a 5/5 rating, they wrote:

Absolutely fabulous! My fiance and I were wary of hiring a DJ because of some bad experiences that some of our friends had during their own weddings where the DJs didn’t listen to what they wanted and just did whatever they (the DJs) wanted. I contacted several DJs early on in my wedding planning and the attitude of quite a few of them was “I’m the DJ and you’re not, I know what the guests like and you don’t.” Well it wasn’t the DJ’s wedding it was ours, and we knew what we wanted!! When I corresponded with Kelly Suit, it was a totally different experience. I could tell he was actually LISTENING to us and that his DJs would be willing to work with us to give us the wedding we wanted. The DJ for our event was Arnoldo Offermann and I can’t praise him highly enough. Our DJ and music have been the two things that we have gotten the most compliments on post-wedding. He had ALL our guests, young and old, dancing the ENTIRE night!!! It was awesome! We gave him a list of “must-play” songs and he totally had it up as he was working and played ALL of them. We had a fairly international crowd, and he played a great mix of Latin, Hip-Hop, Pop, Indian/Turkish, etc. He consulted us every step of the way, and if a guest requested a song that wasn’t exactly the type of music we wanted, he would ask us before playing it. There was a very obscure song that my mother-in-law requested from an old musical, and I found out after the wedding that Arnoldo had gone from CD store to CD store trying to get a copy of that song because it wasn’t available online. We only gave him this request literally the afternoon before the wedding and the song was played exactly as my MIL wanted it! Anyway, all these 5 star reviews didn’t come out of no where, they really are awesome!!!

Click below for some great photos and video!!!

Amazing how well the BOSE system hides in this beautiful setting!!!

Billy, Claudia, myself and Kyle.

Check out the video below:

Located at the Lion’s Eye Center in Ybor, the ceremony was elegant, but totally their style and paved the way for an amazing night to come!

Highlights:

• MARACAS!! (Watch the video)
• I had a heckler… but we got him right back! He was the life of the party.. I think he and Hector are troublemakers, lol.
• Awesome recessional to the wedding. The Lil Jon remix of Suavemente.
• A Puerto Rican and Cuban family mesh— how much crazier can it get?
• Delicious dinner thanks to Michael and his team with Affordable Catering
• A delightful candy bar station compliments of Chanda Janine Ford with Classique Soiree Weddings and Events. (Liset and Hector also won this at a bridal show– LUCKY!!!)

Package Chosen:

• Entertainment Coordinator (Liset won a free DJ package through the PWG bridal show!)
• D’Elegance Lighting: Floods and animated centerpiece
• Ceremony System

As the evening progressed, the party only got wilder…. and then the maracas came out! Matt and I had a blast.. and Matt even got out there and danced with the crowd. Check out the amazing photos and video clip below!

The ever-elegant BOSE system with a custom lighting rig on top. My skirt had gone missing… luckily Kelly was at an event half a mile away and had a spare. Do you know how hard it is to make a table skirt for an 8′ table fit a 3′ and still look elegant?

The centerpiece light was run wirelessly from a corner of the room where it’s out of everyone’s sight.

Centerpieces…

Another angle of my system.

Classique Soiree set up an awesome candy bar!

The party begins!

Liset and her son, DJ. He went to JHS’s homecoming dance we performed at!

ARGH!!! I FORGOT TO GET A PHOTO OF ALL 4 OF US.

Check out the video below!!!

I’ll be honest, the day started in my least favorite form: a 115º heat index. Really, Florida… REALLY??? Kelly and I set up our awesome BOSE sound system along with our D’Elegance lighting and Starfield at the Bilmar Beach Resort in Treasure Island, Florida. While setting up, Kelly and I had a debate on whether Treasure Island is an actual city or a suburb of St. Pete… hmmm…

As we wired our setup to their TV system for the slideshows and music videos, the weather cooled down just in time for the ceremony… beautifully laid out by the beach.

While Kelly supervised the ceremony, I created an image in Photoshop to be shown on the screens as they walked in. It was their monogram laid out as “clouds” on the beach sky. A couple of guests were so impressed they even asked “when did the skywriter come in?”

Along starts the reception and the venue laid out sushi. Truth be told, it was the most delicious sushi I’ve ever had.  Kelly did the MCing and I did the DJing and lights… we’re a good team, this was a DOUBLE Entertainment Coordinator, lol.

The dancing started out like any typical Arnoldo/Kelly wedding (which is usually amazing).. but progressed into something even more….well… amazinger! We got requests for lots of gangsta rap (Snoop Dogg, Dre, 2Pac’s California Love), Old School (This is How We Do It, Jump Jump, Bust a Move), 80s Pop (I Wear my Sunglasss at Night, Walk the Dinosaur) and my personal favorite: FREESTYLE! I felt like I was working at the skating rink again (our good friend Tony would have a chuckle as he always made a joke about us being nothing but skating rink DJs, hahahaha).

You have to watch the video and look at the awesome photos that Kelly took. I must say, I am impressed.

Package chosen:

• Entertainment Coordinator
• Outdoor Ceremony
• D’Elegance Package
• Dance under the Stars
• Video Slideshows
• Music Videos
• Custom Ambients

I have to go now… but click the link below to look at even more photos! Ciao!

The setup:

The ceremony…

The most delicious prime rib in St. Pete!

Outside the hotel:

Dancing!

Video!

Celebrating their ceremony and reception in the cozy Kennilworth Lodge, Abraham and Roxie knew exactly what kind of ceremony they wanted… even before we met!

Choosing many traditional things, they still wanted to add their own spin on things. For example, Roxie isn’t a big fan of cake so instead they opted for a cheesecake and dessert quiche buffet… it was DELICIOUS! Not to mention that all the food was provided by Simply Trish… Trish’s food is amazing!

Another unique touch was the open bar’s selections… the menu of drinks were laid out under the traditional “something new, something blue, something borrowed” phrase seen at many weddings.

I’ve posted my iPhone photos, but will soon post up the photos given to us by Kurz Studios.. they were great to work with and took some great shots!
(http://kurzstudiophotography.com)

Derek, my DJ, and I never laughed harder than at the beginning of the wedding…. we saw two grandmothers chatting to each other as they sat in their wheelchairs waiting for the ceremony room to open. One of them looked up and asked “Do you want to drag?”

That made my day.

The crowd was awesome and they were ready to dance… which was awesome, especially for an afternoon wedding. Enjoy iPhone pics and videos below!

Package chosen:

Entertainment Coordinator w/Bi-Lingual DJ
Ceremony System

This was the Realtor’s Ball at the Chateau Elán in Sebring, Fl. 

I love working there– the staff is amazing and they helped me take this party to a new level. They had an MC who hosted the awards night– he and I had fun ragging on each other… he with his witty banter and myself with music and movie drops. The crowd had a blast! I really wish I shot a video of that part.

Check out the video and leave some comments if you want more info!

With the right vendors. That’s how.  

Enter Joette of Party People (http://partypeople.homestead.com) with her AMAZING balloon sculptures. Instead of boring you with text, I have supplied plenty of photos and video!

Our next step in transforming the hangar was lighting. They didn’t opt for uplighting, except in the Balloon Tunnel and entrance room. 

We used a two-column setup with LEDs that flooded the room with blue (it was a Winter Wonderland theme) with moving head lights that projected snowflakes on the dance floor.

The balloon arch surrounding the floor absorbed the lights and was bursting with color!

Enjoy some great pics and video below!

Update: Welcome DJChat and BalloonHQ members! Be sure to leave a comment!

Here’s Joette next to her giant balloon arch!

White trussing. While most DJs may use metallic trussing, we prefer white as it is more elegant. 

The left wall of the balloon tunnel.

Here’s the arch! No flash used, this is our LEDs at work!

You can see our dual-totem setup!

Here’s the arch, glowing in color!

The entrance room. Joette provided LED Christmas lights and rope light around the room while we supplied blue uplights.

SNOWFLAKES!

More white trussing.

Karen and Neville Williams. When they chose a DJ for this party, we were the obvious choice… after all, we did their wedding three years ago!!!

Here’s me. I’m blurry, lol.

This is my light tech, Derek, doing my job while I’m taking photos.

This little guy here is the life of the party. He was dancing and clapping to every song!

McKesson gave away some awesome gifts… but people had to run up to get them! This guaranteed hilarity! 

Paula, Edyta, Derek, Myself, Karen, and Neville. The three ladies in the photo are responsible for making the party happen!

We pulled the van RIGHT UP TO THE STAGE! It was a flush fit, too! How awesome is that. We loaded up in a matter of minutes!

Enjoy some great video footage below!

At the very end I was greeted with a special request for Karaoke. His name is James and said he’d like to sing Michael Jackson’s Beat It. I asked him if he needed the words and he said no need. He impressed everyone with his singing AND his moves! Honestly, he did this performance better than 99% of Karaoke singers I’ve seen. 

Just watch the video! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

And video!!

WATCH IT!!

The evening started with guests mingling. It was a small crowd of 40+ people, but you could tell they were here to party. Neil (the gentleman who helped put this all together) was going to use Eaglebrooke’s beautiful screen to hook his laptop up to in order to show a special slideshow. Unfortunately, his laptop did not have the proper hookups. Luckily, he had a Blu-Ray player which played photo CDs… unfortunately, the CD was not a photo CD as it was created into a VCD (Video CD).

I offered to step in. Using my Mac laptop (usually my backup), I played their slideshow on LOOP for the entire evening.

*whew* that’s glitch was avoided easily.

Other than that it was a fun party. They LOVED disco and slow songs. I think I played more slow songs this evening than I’ve ever done in 4 hours. At the end of the night, I played the Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go” for everyone to exit out to. THEY KEPT DANCING!

Delores, a big dancer of the evening, asked me if I could sneak in Shake Rattle and Roll. I told her I couldn’t as I was already shut down. She was disappointed, but took the time to compliment me on my music selections and wished me in for next year. What can I say? I’m a sucker for flattery. I unhooked my Mac (my main rig was powered off) from the TV and played her request. Her eyes lit up and she ran to the floor to dance.

EVERYONE CAME RIGHT BACK IN! WOW! I decided to do one more song and did “Nothing But a Hound Dog”… the place erupted.

I left it at that and got a round of applause.. Sweet!!

This was a real appreciative group. Neil gave me a very nice set of thank you bills… always appreciated!

Enjoy photos and video below!

Eaglebrooke adorned my DJ setup with leftover centerpieces. It made my area smell Pine-fresh. I love the smell of Pine!

The staff at Eaglebrooke is serving the food. They are top-notch every time!

Surprise for me! Filet Mignon and Lobster… so good! I had to take a photo and IMMEDIATELY e-mail it to my wife and fellow DJs. Jealousy, arise!

Here are some of the real party animals!

And now a video below!