Wedding gigs can be great, and usually turn out well even if they sometimes get off to a shaky start. The problem is that you never know what to expect. Even if the bride and groom are keen dancers it doesn't follow that their guests will be. Sometimes it feels as if the bride and groom have just said "yes" to everything on the wedding planner's list (Harpist? "yes" chocolate fountain? "yes" chinese lanterns? "yes" ceilidh? "yes") without giving it any thought.

Then there are the totally unsuitable venues, often with a tiny dance floor not suited to people actually moving about, or with half the space specified for the band with no electricity supply in reach. Insufficient time to set up and sound check in a room already being used for speeches. And despite the efforts of a woman at one wedding who had a clipboard with everything scheduled down to the minute ("7.24 pm end of speeches"), they never run on time. And then there are the family disagreements and everyone having had too much to drink...

I've done a wedding gig in a huge castle where there seemed to be lots of other things happening and where literelly no one turned up to dance. We played a few tunes before handing over to the disco, but no one came to dance to him either.

Then there was the wedding in the People's Republic of South Yorkshire where the bride and groom led the company in singing "The Red Flag" (nowt wrong with that, but unusual at weddings in my experience).

There was another gig (possibly not a wedding) where we were asked to stop in mid-dance "because the mayor is leaving". Keith Hancock, never respectful towards authority, just said "goodbye" into his mic and carried on playing.