(Reuters Life!) – Want to blow your guests away with the music at your wedding? Hire the Rolling Stones who are bound to make a big impression on your family and friends — as well as on your bank manager.
The veteran British band has topped a list of the 12 most expensive music acts to perform at weddings that was compiled by Britain’s Living TV. They charge about US$8 million to perform but only agree to private shows if they are already on tour.
Here is the list of the world’s 12 most expensive wedding acts as compiled by Living TV, a unit of Virgin Media Television. Reuters has not endorsed this list.
1. Rolling Stones
2. Elton John is the second most expensive, charging over $2 million for private performances although all earnings from his private concerts go to his charity, the Elton John AIDS Foundation
2. Australian popster Kylie Minogue also charges about $2 million
3. U.S. singer Christine Aguilera charges up to $2 million
4. British pop star George Michael charges almost $2 million
5. George Michael: $2 million
6. Amy Winehouse: $1.5 million
7. Paul McCartney: $1.5 million
8. Leona Lewis: $1.5 million list
9. Jennifer Lopez: $1.5 million
10. Barry Manilow: $1 million
11. Rod Stewart: $1 million
12. Duran Duran: $1 million
Dusty Ricketts – NWFDailyNews.com
Some businesses find a way to thrive even in the toughest of economic times.
During the Great Depression, movies and radio found great success as relatively inexpensive forms of entertainment.
While many businesses are struggling today, one niche enterprise has done well. The popularity of beach weddings has continued to grow this summer.
“The beach wedding business has been great,” said Darrel Jones, executive director of the Okaloosa County Tourist Development Council. “We get an average of seven to nine leads a week (at the TDC). That has grown each year.”
The TDC has advertised its beach wedding opportunities in a popular wedding magazine called Knot. Jones said that has been successful in drawing couples to the Emerald Coast.
Although beach weddings have been big business in the area for years, the economic slump had organizers worried.
“I knew it was a reality out there that people were hurting and people were having to cut back” said Cecilia Cappella, owner of Tropical Beach Weddings in Navarre. “Everyone was concerned. I was concerned as a business owner, being self employed, but I have not seen a decrease at all.”
Cappella said she did not have any wedding cancellations this summer because of lost jobs or anything to do with the economy. She said she only had one couple call to downgrade a previous plan.
Financially, Cappella said she was even with last year’s summer numbers. Things have gone so well this year that Cappella has decided to expand her business next year to add another wedding crew to her staff to increase the number of weddings her company performs.
“It was a very good season. We’re still doing weddings. I’m slammed for September,” she said.
Maggie Halsey, owner of Barefoot Weddings in downtown Fort Walton Beach, said the biggest advantage to a beach wedding is the savings. She said a typical church wedding costs $10,000 to $12,000, whereas the most expensive package she offers is $2,500, which includes the bouquet, photos, chairs, music, decorations and officiating.
“It has been phenomenal,” Halsey said. “I have been really blessed. I just took my first day off since July 4 this past Sunday.”
From OneWed.com
While wedding planning, couples who are hard-core baseball fans may consider incorporating their favorite team into their nuptials – maybe with a cake topper, colors or favors.
Some brides and grooms take their passion even further and tie the knot on a baseball field. This Labor Day weekend, Jennifer Moran and Michael Blair will wed at Wrigley Field, the home of the Chicago Cubs, the News-Gazette reports.
Moran told the newspaper the idea arose because the pair had gotten engaged, but were struggling to get excited about wedding planning.
“I’m not really a girly girl, more of a tomboy,” she explained, adding that choosing a wedding dress and wedding flowers was “the last thing on my mind.”
So, baseball stadium nuptials seemed just the right theme to get both of them excited. According to the article, the pair will walk down the aisle to the theme song from the film The Natural, and guests will dine on hot dogs, corn and ice cream sundaes.
In the past, some couples who tied the knot at Wrigley Stadium have also featured their names in lights on the giant marquee outside.
Hank Baskett and Kendra Wilkinson
By Mark Gray – People.com
With the backdrop of a sunset and an altar bedecked with white flowers, Kendra Wilkinson’s wedding was “absolutely beautiful,” according to one of the bridesmaids.
As for the bride, “She looked like a princess,” Holly Madison told PEOPLE a few hours after Saturday’s nuptials at the Playboy Mansion. “It was a beautiful setting for a wedding.”
Before some 300 guests, including ex-boyfriend Hugh Hefner, the bride and groom Hank Baskett recited traditional vows. Wilkinson wore a white dress with a “tight bodice and poofy skirt,” Madison said.
“It was a princess dress, which was fitting. It was really pretty and she looked gorgeous,” said Madison. who on Sunday returned to Las Vegas, where she stars in the PEEPSHOW revue.
Baskett and the groomsman also donned white for the wedding.
Though Wilkinson, who is due in December, is “getting more pregnant every day,” there was little sign of baby bump in her bridal gown.
Like the wedding, the reception was very traditional. While Wilkinson and Baskett danced the first dance to George Strait’s “I Cross My Heart,” the bride saved the second dance for Hefner.
“They’re definitely ready for their honeymoon now,” Madison said. “They need a vacation.”
Kendra Wilkinson Wedding at Playboy Mansion
Las Vegas Skyline
from Tri City Herald
The time has come in every soon-to-be bride’s life that she embarks on a journey with her closest girlfriends. There will be 4-inch heels. There will be plenty of lip gloss. There will be fake eyelashes. There will be Vegas… Are you not entertained?!
So while most of you have seen The Hangover and have since banned your boyfriends from ever partying it up bachelor style in Vegas, I feel like every guy deserves a chance to walk on the dark side. Granted, if that dark side includes vajayjay up in his face, then that’s pushing it.
Mr. Big’s friends took him to the City of Sin for his bachelor party last week. He drank, he toured, he conquered. Then he came back to work the next day hungover. While I encouraged Big to go to a strip joint just for giggles, only a couple of his friends actually sought-out women in g-strings at 6 in the morning. As I’ve explained to some of my girlfriends, I trust Big, so strippers are not an issue. And my sister gave him a stern lecture that if he did go see strippers, to not touch them because herpes can jump.
Anyway, so now it’s my turn to go to Vegas and as my dad would say, whoop it up. There will be no male strippers or Chippendales adventures. I don’t like banana hammocks all up in my space and male dancers remind me too much of Arnold Schwarzenegger, which creeps me out. Like Kendra Wilkinson, sometimes it’s hot to have female strippers over guys. That way, you get ideas.
While we don’t have any set plans besides eating, shopping, hydrating, clubbing, and sleeping – there are plenty of fun and free things to do in Vegas that aren’t so naughty.
I have yet to see the Bellagio fountains. It’s one of the biggest attractions that takes place every night, but I somehow am nowhere near the Bellagio hotel when the fountain display begins.
The Ferrari display room at the Wynn is only $10. For around the same price you can walk over to the Palazzo for their Lamborghini showroom. Two fabulous brands of cars that you probably can’t afford…
Then there’s the not-so-thrifty things you can do in Vegas, such as entering zero gravity with your friends. It’ll run you over $3,000 – but when else can you pretend to be in outer space besides riding in the rocket ship ride outside of a grocery store?
If you’re a wannabe spy, you should try the Stiletto Spy School, where they teach you hand-to-hand combat, shooting guns and how to mix martinis. Again, it’s over $3,000 for a weekend full of faux spy-filled espionage. Is it really worth it? Maybe… But most of us will never know.
Last time in Vegas, we visited Madam Tussauds’ wax museum for roughly $15. It was a fun tour, ending with the Master Chief from Halo. While I’m more of the video game freak than my friends, it was a good ending to a wonderful trip.
It’ll be hard to top our previous trip last year. Free booze, free clubbing and free silly pictures on the strip – it’s hard to beat. There was even a hot bartender our last night who looked like David Beckham. I hope he still works there…
If you’re not the partying type (surprisingly, I’m not) there’s tons of other family-friendly things to do in Vegas.
Check out the first wedding pictures of Alyssa Milano and Hollywood agent David Bugliari!
The couple tied the knot on Saturday at his family’s New Jersey estate. The walked down the aisle to John Lennon’s Imagine.
“We wanted a wedding that was reflective of who we are as a couple,” the 36-year-old actress told People. “My Italian family still eats Sunday dinner together every week, so we wanted to capture the same feeling with people passing around beautiful bowls of food and talking and laughing.”
She wore a custom gown by Vera Wang. Bradley Cooper of “The Hangover,” a friend of the groom, was among the guests.
Alyssa tweeted, “I’m on my honeymoon [in Tahiti], enjoying my husband, and loving life. Be well. Smile. Until we tweet again…”
- Richard and Catherine Harding
Heather Greenaway – DailyRecord
Letting the groom organise the entire wedding would be most brides’ worst nightmare, but it turned out to be a dream come true for Scot Catherine Tolland.
The 25-year-old handed over total control of her big day to disorganised fiance, Richard Harding, and he got everything spot on – right down to the wedding dress, piper … and limbo dancers.
The happy couple, who star in the new series of BBC Three’s Don’t Tell the Bride, said taking part in the show was both the scariest and most exciting decision they have ever made.
Catherine, of Kirkintilloch, Lanarkshire, admits giving her laid-back husband-to-be free rein left her panic stricken, especially as he had never been to a wedding before.
Learning mentor Catherine said: “Richard was given three weeks and £12,000 to organise the wedding of our dreams, so naturally I was beside myself for most of that time.
“I’m the one, who organises everything in our lives, down to telling him when he is meeting his friends and what we are having for tea.
“Handing over complete control was terrifying. I nearly caved in two or three times, especially when the wedding invitation arrived covered in purple polkadots and tied with a garish tartan ribbon, which I hated.
“But I needn’t have worried as Richard chose the most beautiful gown and arranged a Scottish Caribbean theme to celebrated both our cultures.
“It was perfect and I will never be able to thank him enough.”
Catherine, who met business manager Richard, 25, on their first day at Derby University, signed up to appear on the show after watching the last series.
She said: “Richard proposed to me three years ago and we had been dying to get married, but all our money was being ploughed in to the house.
“We were watching the last series of Don’t Tell the Bride. Richard boasted he could do better than the grooms on it, so I went on-line and filled in an application form.
“A few months later, I was moving in with a friend and leaving my gorgeous fiance to organise the most important day of our lives.”
For three weeks, the pair had no contact and the first hint Catherine got was when the invite dropped through the letterbox.
She said: “It was at that moment it suddenly became real and the panic set in.
“I had told the producers I hated purple, and the invites were covered in lilac spots. It did not bode well.”
Catherine, who first met Richard when she burned toast and set off the fire alarm in student halls, admits shaking on her way to the bridal shop on the day before the wedding.
She said: “I was so worried about the dress, my dad had given me a credit card in case he had picked me something horrific with lots of flounces.
“I was shocked when the lady produced my gown – but in a good way.
“It was simple, with lots of crystals, although a bit more blingy than I would have chosen. I loved it.
“He even picked out a tiara and a veil, which I felt sure he would forget. I was struggling to hold back the tears when I tried it on for the first time.”
On the big day, Catherine was delighted when her dad John, 52, arrived at her door in a tartan kilt, picked by Richard.
She said: “He had a purple tartan and a matching cravat and looked fab.”
But she was less keen on the bridesmaids’ outfits.
Catherine added: “I was just hoping my bridesmaids would not be in purple and, lo and behold, they were.
“They definitely were not dresses I would have picked but they grew on me as the day went on.”
Richard, whose dad is from Guyana, incorporated thistles into all the bouquets and even hired a piper.
Catherine, who lives with Richard in Solihull, near Birmingham, said: “He had chosen cream roses, my favourite calla lilies and thistles for my bouquet.
“When we got to Wroxhall Abbey, in Warwickshire, there was a piper playing. I couldn’t believe he had managed to get somewhere so beautiful on May bank holiday weekend.”
Catherine, who threw her arms round Richard when she got to the end of the aisle, added: “I was so pleased to see him, I gave him a massive hug. I was so happy I didn’t even think about the reception, which was also perfect.
“The tables had beautiful thistle centrepieces and the cake had little people on top that looked like us. I was in heaven. I realised I was panicking for nothing.”
But the best was yet to come. Richard had arranged a Caribbean-themed surprise for the evening.
Catherine said: “After the meal, we were all called to the terrace where there he was, in a Hawaiian shirt, playing with a steel band. He had been taking secret lessons.
“Next thing I knew, all the guests were limbo dancing and we were setting sky lanterns off into the night sky. It was the perfect end to a perfect day.”
Richard, who has become a hero to all his wife’s female friends, said: “I spent the whole three weeks getting up at 8am and going to bed at 3am. Thank goodness for the internet because I’d never been to a wedding and didn’t know what to do.
“Luckily everything kept falling into place.We got the venue due to a cancellation.
“In the bridal shop all the dresses looked the same to me, so my best man Phil went next door and grabbed a hairdresser to model a few.
“Catherine loved her dress and that made me so happy, even though I think she would have looked good in a paper bag.”
Catherine added: “It was extremely stressful letting the cameras into our lives at such an important time, but it was worth it. The memory will be with us forever.”
Don’t Tell The Bride is on BBC 3 at 8pm on September 1. Catherine’s and Richard’s wedding will feature on September 8.
Geoffrey Edelsten and fiancee Brynne Groden. Picture by Jay Town
Nui Te Koha – HeraldSun
CELEBRITY doctor Geoffrey Edelsten has revealed details of a multi-million dollar wedding spectacular with bride-to-be Brynne Groden.
Dr Edelsten, 66, claims he and Ms Groden, 25, will marry at Crown casino with Seinfeld’s Jason Alexander and The Nanny star Fran Drescher officiating at the reception.
He says ’70s supergroup Fleetwood Mac is in talks to perform at the November ceremony.
“I’m somewhat modest, so I think the wedding will be for others to judge,” Dr Edelsten told the Sunday Herald Sun.
“But I don’t think Melbourne will have seen an event quite like this. I’ve got a good imagination and we have many surprises planned.”
Dr Edelsten said the wedding will also raise money for charity.
In a candid, wide-ranging interview:
Dr Edelsten said he does not notice the 41-year age difference between him and Ms Groden.
Ms Groden said she is not marrying for money.
He proposed with a 5.8-carat diamond ring and a box of doughnuts.
“Brynne has brought stability, fun and a new dimension to my life,” Dr Edelsten said.
“Instead of thinking about work and football, it’s Brynne, football and work in that order. I love her.”
A controversial figure, Dr Edelsten was sentenced to 12 months’ jail after being found guilty of soliciting hitman Christopher Flannery to assault a former patient he claimed had harassed him.
He was released in 1991.
“There are a number of regrets of certain events – some completely beyond my control,” he said.
“But it’s well and truly passed. I’m lucky to have succeeded despite those events. I am lucky I found Brynne.”
Ms Groden, a former fitness trainer and online music producer from West Hollywood, said: “Geoffrey has changed my entire life.
“I’ve never had anyone who makes me feel so special, every day, all through the day. He cares so much. I love him.”
Dr Edelsten and Ms Groden met through mutual friends in Los Angeles last October.
In November, Dr Edelsten called Ms Groden from London asking her to meet him in Las Vegas for their first date.
“I was very nervous,” he said. “I was like a teenager.”
They stayed, and shopped, at Caesars Palace, and saw the Cirque Du Soleil show, Love.
“We were standing in line to get candy and I found her demeanour so attractive,” Dr Edelsten said. “She was tactile, she touched me on the shoulder. I felt so lucky. I’ve never felt like that before. I was a goner.”
Ms Groden added: “He was charming, funny, kind and went out of his way to make me feel special.”
They had follow-up dates in Los Angeles and Melbourne. By December, Dr Edelsten was in love. Soon after, he proposed on bended knee.
But it wasn’t an act of tradition. He was fresh out of hospital after a knee operation and couldn’t stand.
They are inviting 500 guests, including family, friends and Carlton and Sydney football players.
Guests will be asked to donate money to four charities: Australian Indigenous Education Foundation, Australian Sports Foundation, Israeli Red Cross and Cancer Schmancer.
In Thailand Sarojin has created a six night luxurious honeymoon experience, designed to provide a level of personalised service and hospitality that makes the honeymoon just as special as the wedding day.
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A deluxe holiday experience, it is a wonderfully indulgent romantic retreat and priced from approximately £1,560 per couple, and the Luxurious Honeymoon Experience includes the extras that make such an occasion truly memorable.
