Los Angles Klezmer Wedding Bands

One of my brothers is getting married in the spring in LA (Yay!). We're all quite thrilled. He and his fiancée are thinking about booking a klezmer band and they gave me ring the other night hoping I might help the find the right folks. I sure hope I can, because my wife and I had the most amazing klezmer wedding band in the world (The Wholesale Klezmer Band) for our wedding and they absolutely made the night. (Unfortunately, the WKB is based in New England, which is pretty darn far from LA)

One of things that makes looking for a klezmer wedding band tricky is that not all klezmer bands want to or know how to play weddings. And by this I don't mean that the good klezmer band doesn't know how to show up, play a set at the reception and then scram. For me there are two big questions (other than can they play), can they lead dancing and do they understand / can they participate in the traditional Jewish ceremony. These are both big deals. If you grew up in the Conservative movement like I did, it's pretty likely that the closest thing to Jewish dancing most of your family has done was watch Fiddler on the Roof ten years ago. Having someone show basic dance steps helps folks stop thinking about their feet and just enjoy the dancing. Being able to show more than one dance (or throw in a showy little bottle dance) helps keep things interesting and everyone engaged.

Understanding the wedding process is important too. There are a lot of wonderful Jewish wedding traditions that get overlooked at most liberal Jewish weddings but are easy and rewarding to include and demand musical accompaniment / leadership. This includes the Khosns Tish, Groom's Party, and Kale Bazetsn, Seating of the Bride, as well as including a Badkhones, Wedding Jester, to amuse the bride, saterize the groom and generally cause trouble/joy. (See the Wholesale Klezmer Band's 'Guide To Jewish Weddings' for more info).

For me, finding out if the band can lead the dancing and can support the traditional Jewish wedding process is much more important than finding out whether they can slip a few swing tunes into the mix. That's what makes looking for a band hard. Most bands websites don't say whether they really want and can handle weddings. So it takes time to feel them out.

Here's the list of LA area bands I came up with for my brother and his fiancée, in more or less my priority order based on their websites (not factoring in $$, which I don't have yet). I'll be helping him vet the bands and will probably keep everyone posted on how it goes. If anyone knows a good klezmer wedding band that would play in the LA area that I didn't list, please let me know.

Ventura Klezmer Band: http://www.venturaklezmerband.com/ - Sounds excellent, does weddings, dance leading - yes, traditional ceremony - don't know. Lots of testimonials on the web page. A great sign.

Hollywood Kelzmer Band - http://www.hollywoodklezmer.com/ Sounds excellent, does weddings, don't know about dance leading or traditional ceremony

Klezmer Juice - http://www.klezmerjuice.com/ Sounds excellent, but don't know if they do weddings (extra points for being the wedding band in the movie "Wedding Crashers" UPDATE: Gustavo Bulgach from Klezmer Juice wants everyone to know that they definitely play weddings. 'we DO weddings... actually, WE did produce an play @ the Jewish wedding scene for the movie WEDDING CRASHERS... need more credentials?" Nope. Sounds great to me.

Extreme Klezmer - http://www.extremeklezmer.com/home.html - Sounds excellent, but don't know if they do weddings

Golden State Klezmer - http://www.goldenstateklezmers.com - Sounds excellent, but don't know if they do weddings

Dave Winstone - http://davewinstone.com/Klezmer.htm Does weddings, but isn't as klezmer focused as I'd like and doesn't provide sound samples on the website.

Ellis Island Band - http://www.ellisislandband.com/ No sound samples, don't know if they do weddings)

The Klezmer Boys - http://www.myspace.com/KlezmerBoys They'll do weddings, but the sound samples are pretty mediocre. (That's just my impression / taste. To me they sound like a classic cheesy wedding band, which I don't like. But that might be exactly what someone else is looking for. So they're on the list)

UPDATE: Keith and DrumSteve from the South Coast Simcha Band want everyone to know that they play weddings in the LA area and "perform a lively brand of East Coast style of Yiddish and Klezmer music ...with Jazz, Swing, Classic Rock, and Pop tunes for all of your guests to enjoy" Sorry for missing you, guys. My goof. You should add the term "Los Angeles" to your web page and make it easy for us 'googlers' to find you.