How to Hire a Professional Bellydancer For Your Wedding

Your wedding day is the most important day of your life!  The vendors that you hire can make or break your entire wedding day.  The banquet hall, florist, DJ, photographer, videographer, etc each are unique in bringing their services, talents and ideas to help create the perfect wedding day.  Just as the perfect team can create the best wedding day, the opposite can hold true.  If you hire the wrong vendor, they can very easily create memories that you’d rather forget.  This is why it is so important to take your time and to do a thorough interview when hiring your wedding vendors to make sure they offer exactly what you want to have at your wedding.

There are some fundamental points to consider when interviewing and selecting your vendors.  The most basic point to consider - are you comfortable talking to the vendor?  Is the person listening to every single thing you are saying, or interrupting to tell you their ideas or their past experience in the business?  How do you feel when you’re talking to the vendor - do you feel rushed or belittled?  Does the person make you feel more anxiety about your wedding day, or do you feel heard, more at ease, comfortable?  Can you breathe a sigh of relief?  How you feel is extremely important to take note, as this is just the beginning of a series of conversations that will culminate in your wedding day - the most important day of your life!

When conducting your search for the right team for your wedding, you should have a general idea of the style of wedding you are going for.  Look at pictures of different wedding different themes and ideas - what do you love and what do you not like?  These are key points in figuring out your general style.  You need to know if you want the farm style wedding, the princess royal wedding, the glamorous Hollywood wedding, rustic wedding, destination wedding, etc.  After you have your general theme in place, you can have conversations with potential vendors that target exactly what you have in mind.  You can find out if the vendor has experience in exactly what you are looking for and you should definitely ask for photos and videos with samples showing their work.  

Make sure the potential vendors are clearly representing their work in the conversation.  In other words, look at their online presence.  Social media is the perfect example.   Are they up to date in their posts?  How about their recent tags - are clients tagging them and saying good things about them?  Is the quality of the photos and videos professional?  Look at their google reviews to make sure they are upstanding and forthcoming in the quality of the work they stand behind. Social media makes it very easy to contact anyone who is tagged to find out about their experience.  Some questions to consider, “ Would you do anything different in regards to this vendor?,” “If given the chance, would you hire this vendor again?”  Asking the most recent clients is a sure way to get very accurate information about the level of professionalism and service you will receive.

When planning your wedding, you will also want to consider adding an element that will make your wedding memorable for your guests.  My bellydance show would be the ideal addition to your wedding.  I’ve performed at countless weddings over the course of my career and my experience has led to me to understand the nature of the wedding industry and how important it is to have a very high level bellydance show.  Every detail from the style of the bellydancer, costuming, bellydance props, musical selections and flow needs to be discussed to make sure you are getting a memory that you will cherish forever.  Not all bellydancers are the same!  My experience performing at countless weddings throughout my bellydance career led me to be able to narrow down a list of things you should look for when hiring a professional bellydancer for your wedding.

When you are hiring a professional bellydancer for your wedding, you should consider the style, character and personality of the dancer. How does the bellydancer conduct herself on the dance floor?  Keep in mind that your entire family is expected to be there - grandparents, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews…  This means the dancer needs to perform in such a way so as not to offend the older generation and also to be appropriate to the younger generation.  This is where you need to know that not all bellydancers are the same!  It all boils down to how the dancer is going to present herself to your guests.  What types of movements does she use in her particular style of bellydance?  What props will she use?  This is where it is absolutely mandatory that you review her videos to make sure she is the right fit for your particular crowd.  Look at the videos on her Instagram and TikTok and make sure you search for  wedding performances in particular.  It is absolutely true that bellydancers will perform differently in a nightclub setting versus a wedding, so be mindful in how you will interpret the videos you watch.  You should ask for wedding bellydance video samples specifically.

When deciding if the dancer is going to be the appropriate bellydance performer for your wedding, you should definitely discuss costuming.  What is the dancer going to wear?  Color palette might be very important so that she can coordinate with your bridal party - this just depends on personal preference of the bride and groom.  Adding to this, you need to absolutely look at the style of the bellydance costume.  Bellydance costumes are some of the most creative designs in the fashion world.  They come in all different sorts of cuts, fabrics, textures and sizes.  That being said, you need to know if the costume is appropriate for your wedding.  I have performed my bellydance show at countless weddings over the years - sometimes for a conservative crowd and other times for a more open-minded audience.  When I am asked to perform bellydance for a modest audience, I sometimes wear long sleeves, cover my midriff and do not expose the entire length of my legs.  It is very important that I understand the nature of the expectations of the crowd and adjust my style accordingly.  That being said, for the less conservative crowd I am able to show more of my legs, midriff and the entire length of my arms.  If this isn’t discussed and decided in advance, it can completely ruin your wedding and leave your guests with a negative impression and with memories they would wish to forget.

Another important consideration to make when hiring a professional bellydancer for your wedding is the style of music she will use for her bellydance show.  Who are your guests and who do you want the music to appeal to?  Are your guests from a specific country and do you want to use music to represent your culture?  Are the guests from various cultures and you need the music to speak to many different cultures?  Is this an older crowd who wants classic music, or is it a younger crowd who just wants everyone up and dancing from the first song?  Do you have specific songs you want the bellydancer to use for your wedding bellydance show?  An experienced and professional bellydancer knows the different genres and types of music for bellydance and can identify what music can work for each particular crowd.  That being said, and experienced and professional bellydancer knows when to use certain songs in the placement of their show.  An experienced and professional bellydancer will also know how to be able to organize and control the audience when the moment comes and everyone wants to dance.  Again, not all bellydancers are the same!  Make sure you talk about all of this when you are looking to hire a professional bellydancer for your wedding.  The wrong musical choices for the bellydance show can dampen the mood and crush the excitement and flow of your wedding reception.

A true professional and experienced bellydancer will be able to navigate you in creating the ideal wedding entertainment bellydance show.  You should be able to have a clear idea of the style of the show, costuming, musical choices and flow.  I love speaking to my clients about the bellydance show and I always make myself available for conversations to get all of the details squared away before the event.  I’ve been performing bellydance at weddings for the entire duration of my career and just like not all bellydancers are the same, not all weddings are the same.  I take my time to make sure I customize my show for each specific audience and that I meet the needs of my dear clients.  My experience as a professional bellydancer has proved to be a valuable addition to making each and every wedding memorable and unique for the bride and the groom and their guests.

Yasmeena is a professional bellydancer who is passionate about performing bellydance at weddings.  To book her for your wedding, email info@beautifulbellydance.com or text/call 1.917.282.7083.