Services
“Elegant and hip live music performed with great skill, passion and artistry will uplift and enhance the mood of you’re wedding day or special event celebration like nothing else can!”
John Chapman’s exceptional live music, with hands-on professional services creates superb musical ambiances for you're upcoming Weddings, Corporate or Social event celebrations.
Regardless of you're venue’s size and itinerary, 10 to 200 guests or more, indoors and outdoors location, from solo classical guitar music during you're ceremony or a Jazz, Brazilian, and Pop trio for your cocktail and dinner hours, to a 10-piece dance band with a full horn section playing you're favorite Motown, Rhythm and Blues, Disco, Funk and Rock styles for your reception, or 4-hours of solo multi-style classical guitar music throughout, John's passion for music and attention to detail is evident from beginning to end.
Music Services Details
- Multi-Style Solo Classical Guitar or Band Music with duos, trios, quartets and larger ensembles: guitar, male and female vocals, keyboards, piano, bass, percussion, drums, sax—soprano, alto, tenor, trumpet, trombone, violin, cello, flute, and harp
- Custom song-lists, accommodating special song requests for your wedding ceremony or to meet your corporate or social events clientele and theme
- High fidelity amplification systems and top quality music gear that always produce excellent concert-quality sound coverage and leave a small safe footprint–with portable battery-powered amplification provided for locations without electricity (solo guitar only)
- Microphone, clip, cable, and stand with small portable battery powered amplifier for your ceremony vows and officiate, or announcements
- Music consultations by phone for social, business and corporate events, or phone or meet John in person in John’s Montclair, Oakland Music Studio, for Wedding clients
Inquire about availability, music services, pricing and to have a full conversation about your events music details.
Bookings & Rates
Bookings are secured by contract and deposit, payable by cash, check or PayPal; sent by postal mail, fax and email.Rates include travel expenses, tax, one-hour prior set-up, prompt breakdown, high fidelity sound amplification system, detailed music consultation, performance materials and portable battery powered amplification for solo guitar only. Bookings and contact.
Weddings
You're wedding day is one of the most important days of you're life! Your music's message and the energy it's performed with is paramount in bringing out the emotions and joys of you're special day!
Ceremony Song Requests
Most clients can find songs in John's repertoire that they love and embody the the emotion there looking for but John also extends himself to create beautiful solo guitar arrangements from scratch, by condensing multi-instrumental and/or band studio recordings with vocals, with and without sheet music. Call or Email John directly to receive his deep song solo classical guitar repertoire list to help you choose your ceremony and reception songs from and/or send him your special ceremony song requests MP3 files or YouTube links via email.
After John receives your song files or links, he will listen to and play your songs to determine their viability in the chord-melody solo guitar idiom, and then need to speak with you by phone to discuss all the those pertinent details and to help you create a beautiful ceremony song list.
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John provides feedback about each songs length, tempo, rhythm, and melody and key, and how well songs gel from one to another in relation to the number of processionals you have, how many people are walking, and how long each processional walkway is. Often ceremony songs are often shortened to accommodate shorter processional walkway lengths, and shortened processional songs last on average about one minute to two and half minutes per processional. Full song performances over two and half minutes, looped song sections and improvisations can always accommodate longer processionals, interludes or post-ceremony special song requests, patient brides, grooms and officiants. Crafting excellent solo guitar arrangements can often take adequate prep time, and although most special song requests fall within 5-hours of practice time, adding extra fees can accommodate any song you absolutely must have performed when extra practice time preparations are needed.
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Chord Melody and Solo Guitar Idiom
Songs, instrumental or vocal, traditional or contemporary, crafted into great sounding solo guitar arrangements are often called chord melody songs, performed in the solo guitar idiom,. These songs have strong memorable melodies and signature melody hook licks or riffs, and or equally memorable chord progressions that retain and deliver the intended musical message, identity and emotional impact, so there most recognizable to a listening audience and enjoyable to perform.
With that said, ballads and slower medium tempo songs where melodies and chords share similar rhythms that can be played together at the same time usually make the most listener and performer friendly ceremony song choices.
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So you can understand what works as solo guitar piece even better. Poor chord melody songs lack strong melodies and melodic and chordal rhythmic consistency. Meaning the melody rhythms are much faster than the chords (or visa versa,) or the songs tempo is too fast, forcing guitar soloists to play either mostly chords or melody alone. Usually playing chords alone will sound bland without a recognizable melody to hum along with and playing mostly melody will sound quite thin and empty without sufficient chordal harmony. To understand your songs general viability as a solo guitar arrangement, please see if you can find any solo guitar arrangements on YouTube and have a basic awareness of these basic song parts 1) melody, instrumental or vocal, 2) harmony, guitar or piano chords, 3) the bass line, in that order of importance. This will save you and I some valuable time. :)
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Processionals Timing and Cue Person
After the standard of 30 to 45 minutes of pre-ceremony solo classical guitar music to delight your guests and set the proper mood leading into your ceremony processional songs, it’s best factor in one to two minutes of musical silence before your processionals start. This properly frames your pre-ceremony music from your ceremony music, creating the proper emotional impact and lets everyone, your family and special guests; processional participants and you know that your ceremony processionals are about to begin. This pause also provides John with time to make necessary guitar playing preparations in tuning, capo, and page turns. Processional details in timing, amount and, length of walkway and of course songs are chosen in advance of your date but it’s important you choose an attentive professional cueing person to coordinate with John so this all goes smoothly. The cue person is usually the wedding planner, event specialist at the venue, a family member or close friend or the officiate. Whom ever you choose should introduce him or herself upon John's arrival or during his pre-ceremony performance set-up and if possible provide John with a 2 to 5 minute heads up when they think you're ceremony processionals are ready to start. The biggest detail is how your processionals start!
Simply put—you're cueing person should always wait for the music, John’s guitar playing, before they send people down the walk to start you're first processional and especially during you're bridal processional. After your cueing person gives John the thumbs up that you’re all ready to start, John can then begin when it feels best within the next 30 seconds to 120 seconds. It may feel like an hour but it’s not.
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Also based on the walkway lengths in relation each songs length and your processionals itinerary of how many people are walking when you may decide it’s best to have your cueing person hold up your processional participants from walking for 10 to 30 seconds after the music begins so there isn’t 90 seconds of music that still needs to be played for extra short walkways or anxious officiates. This crates greater emotional impacts between processionals, so it doesn’t all sound and feel like one big blur of music. Understand that although John or and his colleagues can improvise out of most situations, your songs length, and arrangement had been arranged and practiced prior for proper musical impact to meet your processionals runway length and ceremony processionals itinerary, so it’s always better to leave the musical baton in John’s court so as not to make him or any musician chase hastily started processionals. Attention to these details will make sure your processionals musical timing and itinerary flow smoothly, and so you’re carefully chosen ceremony songs will shine in the best light. This allows the music performance’s to bring out each songs beauty and create the most heartfelt and expansive musical ambiance performed and timed to perfection!
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Wedding Ceremony Processional and Recessional Basics
- Groom and parents (entrance-beginning)
- Groomsman and bridesmaids processional
- Ring bearer and flower girls processional
- Bridal processional
- Married couple recessional (end-beginning)
* Your wedding ceremony music song-list, pre ceremony and reception music is always tailored to suit your specific wedding music needs.
Pre-Ceremony and Reception Music – Lunch, Cocktails, Dinner and Dancing
After you’ve chosen your ceremony music, shared the musical styles you want performed and checked off your favorite songs from John’s 100 song solo guitar repertoire, you can count on John to create spontaneous sets that meld timeless classics, contemporary gems and improvisations to create a beautiful flowing musical ambiance during all phases of your wedding day celebration.
Music Equipment, Set-up, Electricity, and Itinerary Planning
Prior to and on the day off your wedding day, John will coordinate with you and or your wedding specialists (wedding planner, venue event manager or home owner) to identify the best music performance locations, based on venue layout, available electricity, and your wedding itinerary, to always provide you and your guests with timely and continuously excellent sound coverage that creates a small safe equipment footprint.
Duos, Trios, Quartets or Larger Bands
Enjoy duos and larger band performances, instrumental and with vocals. Duos consist of: two guitars, two guitars with vocals, guitar with: keyboards and piano, bass, percussion, drums, sax, trumpet, trombone, violin, cello, flute and harp, or any configuration you desire to create the beautiful and expansive musical ambiance in alignment with your musical tastes and weddings ceremony, reception, cocktails, dinner and dancing hours. Inquire about your dream bands line-up and discuss pricing.
Corporate and Small Business
Let John Chapman’s 20 years of superb solo guitar music and top-notch bands, both instrumental and vocal, performing all popular musical styles, with a prodigious repertoire to provide you with the band size and instrumentations of your choice, to add the right musical touches for your next corporate celebration, entertaining your key clients, vendors or reward your employees with a team outing.
- Brunch, Lunch, and Dinner Events
- Food and Wine Tasting Events and Tours
- Business Launches and Anniversary Events
- Small Business Celebrations
- Destination Events (San Francisco and Los Angeles, Napa, Sonoma and Mendocino Wine Country, Lake Tahoe, Yosemite, Reno NV, Ashland OR, New York City NY, Costa Rica, Mexico, The Hawaiian Islands and worldwide)
Social
John Chapman’s beautiful solo guitar and band music, with his friendly and professional demeanor always enhances intimate gatherings like your upcoming: wine tasting events, birthday or anniversary parties, bar or bat mitzvah’s, community gatherings, neighborhood associations and country club celebrations, restaurant celebrations, art gallery openings, private parties, rehabilitation clinics and care centers lunches and dinners, school master classes and assemblies, and all other social event celebrations.
Contact John for bookings, availability, music services, pricing and to have a full conversation about your special events music details.