The type of event you are holding will greatly influence what entertainment you should hire. Whether it be a formal corporate function, a wedding, a 21st birthday, a family reunion or a fund raiser, you need to choose the right entertainment to suit the personalities of your guests and also the occasion. You may choose to organise the whole event yourself, including hiring the venue, choosing the food and booking the entertainment, or you may prefer to contact a party hire company and get them to handle everything. Whatever you choose the entertainment still needs careful consideration.
Formal Corporate Events
For a formal event, whether it be a black tie dinner or business orientated do, suitable entertainment needs to be arranged that is more on the conservative side. Having a roving belly dancer would not be appropriate, nor would a heavy metal rock band. You may choose to start the evening with drinks in a separate foyer and have a string quartet playing or an A Capella group singing. Your entertainment could also be in the form of ice sculptures which are positioned around the venue and are carved into shapes that best represent the evening or the company.
Themed Event
Themed events could range from an elegant formal evening, to a casual party, or day time get together. Themes are great to work to when you are planning an event because you can link everything in, from costumes, food, decorations and also your entertainment. For a corporate gathering you might choose a masquerade ball or an Arabian Nights theme. This is where hiring a belly dancer to entertain guests is appropriate, even if it’s a more formal occasion, it is acceptable within the theme. Themes open the doors to a huge range of entertainment ideas, limited only by your creativity. Choirs, face painters, story tellers, dancers, bands, puppeteers, artists or even a fire eater. The event could become quite a spectacle if you have the right theme to work with.
Step Back in Time
Similar to choosing a theme, you may want to have guests dress in period costume and have the event based around a particular decade. Guests often love to wear fancy dress and it is a fantastic way to break the ice at any party as guests will, more often than not, talk about their costume. You may choose to take your guests way back in time to ancient Rome or the Middle Ages, or you could simply choose a more recent decade, like the 1920s or 40s. When choosing an era think about how you can decorate the venue, what food would continue the theme and also what sort of music would suit. It may be a little difficult to replicate lutes and other instruments found during the time of Camelot, or it may be a little uninteresting to dance to, so perhaps you might choose some time in the 1900s. A swinging jazz band in the style of the 1920s or a big band like the 1940s would get everyone up and dancing and would be a party not easily forgotten.
