expert.band for wedding bands

A wedding band's year is 30 to 60 Saturdays, each one sold 6 to 18 months in advance to a couple who has never booked a band before. The work is not the playing; it is the enquiries, the availability checks, the quotes, the special requests and the logistics of getting eight people and a PA to a barn by 4 pm.

This is how expert.band fits that workflow, step by step, with the honest limits.

The enquiry: is the band free?

A couple writes on Monday about a Saturday in June next year. Before you can quote you need to know whether the band can play, which in most bands means asking six people who each have another band, a day job and a family.

In expert.band, you create the gig as a request with the date, the venue and whatever you know, and send an availability request to the members. Each one gets a personal link by email and, if they have a phone number, by SMS. They tap "I'm available" or "I can't make it"; no login, works from any phone. The gig page shows who answered, who is available, who is not, and who has not replied, with a reminder button for the last group.

Most bands have an answer by the evening. If the drummer cannot make it, you know before you quote, and you can decide whether to book a dep (see deps and substitute musicians) or price accordingly. Requests and confirmed gigs show in different colours in the calendar, so a request never looks like a booking.

Limits: the request goes to band members. A dep who is not a member does not receive it; you still text them. And SMS come from a monthly allowance of 50 per account; email is unlimited and always sent.

The quote: in their language, as a link

Wedding couples compare quotes. A quote that is clear, itemised and easy to open on a phone gets accepted more often than an attachment.

Build the service catalog once: Ceremony music (acoustic trio, 30 min), Drinks reception set (60 min), Evening party (2 x 60 min), DJ set between sets, Sound and lights for 120 guests, Travel beyond 50 km, Overtime per 30 min. Each item has a category, a description, a default length and a default price, with translations if you quote in more than one language. Six languages are supported in the app: English, German, French, Spanish, Italian and Russian.

A quote then has sections for the schedule (the timeline as you propose it: 14:00 ceremony, 15:00 reception set, 20:30 first dance, 21:00 party), the services from the catalog, coverage (what is included), pricing with an optional VAT rate, and free text for the introduction and payment terms. Optional items (the DJ set, a saxophonist) can be listed but excluded from the total, so the couple sees what they could add.

The couple receives a private link: a clean web page in the quote's language with a Download PDF button. The quote moves through draft, sent, accepted and declined; when they accept, you link it to the gig and the gig shows the total. For the writing side, see writing a quote clients accept; for how the links work, see quotes and client links explained.

Limits: the link is unguessable but not password protected, and the client cannot accept with a button on the page; acceptance is something they tell you and you record. expert.band does not produce the contract, the invoice or the deposit request; those live in your documents and your accounting.

The setlist: by moment, with timings

Weddings are a sequence of moments with different music: ceremony, drinks, dinner background, first dance, party. In the repertoire, labels such as Ceremony, Dinner, First dance, Party opener and Closer let you filter for each moment. Each song holds its key, tempo, structure and length, plus attachments: chords typed as text, a PDF chart, a reference recording.

A wedding setlist is built by dragging songs in, with breaks labelled (Speeches, Cake, Break 20 min) and a note per item (the first dance in the couple's requested key, the groom's brother joining for one song). The running time is calculated, so a 2 x 60 minute booking shows as two sets of the right length. Duplicate your standard wedding setlist per couple, swap in their requests, and attach it to the gig. On the night, print gives a large-type version with key and tempo and, if you want, the chords after each song.

For the musical side, see building a wedding setlist that fills the floor.

Requests from the couple

Couples send requests months ahead: five must-plays, three do-not-plays, the first dance. Practical approach in expert.band:

• Must-plays already in the repertoire: label them for this wedding, or simply place them in the couple's setlist.
• New songs: add them as proposals so the band votes on whether to learn them, or add them straight to the repertoire with the recording link as the first attachment when the couple's request is not optional.
• The first dance: add it as a song with a note in the structure ("play intro twice, end on the chorus at 3:10") so everyone learns the same version.

Rehearsing the special material

A new first dance and two requests per wedding add up over a season. In Rehearsals, members paint their free hours; the leader picks a slot from the heat map and schedules it with a note listing the songs to prepare. Reminders go by email and SMS 12 hours before by default. Details in the rehearsal planner explained.

Packing for a barn 90 km away

Wedding gigs are the ones where a forgotten item cannot be fetched. Build the inventory once (microphones, stands, cables, the PA, lights, the gaffer tape) and save a kit per show type: Ceremony trio, Full band with own PA, Full band with venue PA. Apply the kit to the gig, adjust quantities, assign who brings what. Members see their items on the gig page; you tick them off as the van is loaded and the list shows what is still missing and whose it is. The same list in reverse gets everything home at 1 am. See packing lists and kits explained.

The gig sheet

The printed gig sheet is one document: date and times, the address with a map link, the line-up, the setlist and the packing list. Members open the same gig on their phones. This replaces the "what time do we have to be there?" message that arrives on the morning of every wedding.

After the wedding

Mark the gig as done in your own process; the record of the setlist attached to it becomes your history of what was played where. Once or twice a year, run a rating round: every member rates every song on audience appeal, performance and enjoyment from a personal link, and the results show which songs to cut and which to rehearse. Wedding repertoires grow by request and rarely shrink on their own; see rating your repertoire.

What it costs a wedding band

3.90 € or $ a month for one band, after a 30-day trial with no card; 30% less on yearly billing; members free; 50 SMS a month included. A band that plays 30 weddings a year pays under 50 a year for it. If you run a second line-up (an acoustic trio for ceremonies) as a separate band, that is 2.00 a month more. See pricing.

Do this today

• Create the band and paste the wedding repertoire, then label songs by moment: Ceremony, Dinner, First dance, Party.
• Build the catalog from your current price list: 6 to 10 items.
• Enter next season's confirmed weddings and attach your standard setlist to the next one.
• Save one kit for your most common wedding setup and apply it to that gig.
• Send an availability request for the next open enquiry instead of asking in the chat.