No amplified music?

[mark@pegasus]

I had something similar a couple of years ago, the venue in question had their licence revoked 4 days before the wedding. I spoke to the licencing office at my local council (not the one that revoked the licence) and they told me that if I was an invited guest supplling music for free than the licence would not be needed, so our way around this was for the bride to cancel me in writing as per T&C thus I get paid cancellation fee and they then invited me as a guest of the wedding. Hope that helps.

[DazzyD]

No way round it. They need to find another venue. End of.

There are plenty of ways around it. You just need to establish the reason why the venue have said they can't allow amplified music.

As has been said, if it's due to the venue only having the new basic entertainment licence, which doesn't allow the use of amplified music, then the client (not just the venue) may apply for a temporary "one-off" licence to cover the event. The client will need a PPL licence which costs as little as £11.86 for a one off event (http://www.ppluk.com/Documents/Tarif...s/PPLPP002.pdf). The client may also need a PRS for Music licence but, in this case where the event is a private one with only privately invited guests in attendance and is not open to the general public, PRS for Music would waive the licence requirement. So, for this event, I'm assuming under 500 guests, the licence charge would be merely £11.86 (not sure if this is with or without VAT, though).

Now, another scenario is where the venue has had it's licence revoked due to not complying with the terms of the licence. But, again, there are ways around this as Mark has suggested:

I had something similar a couple of years ago, the venue in question had their licence revoked 4 days before the wedding. I spoke to the licencing office at my local council (not the one that revoked the licence) and they told me that if I was an invited guest supplling music for free than the licence would not be needed, so our way around this was for the bride to cancel me in writing as per T&C thus I get paid cancellation fee and they then invited me as a guest of the wedding. Hope that helps.

Now, we've covered music/performance licences but the venue may have been subject to noise control (ie after complaints from neighbours that the noise was too loud). This would be a different kettle of fish altogether as the venue itself may be restricted from obtaining one-off licences (this is a very rare occurance and would be dealt with by the Local Authority). I would then be looking at obtaining advice from the Local Authority under which the venue comes under. Only then can you make an informed decision on how to proceed. I'm assuming that all health & safety licences and policies, fire certificate, etc. are in place at the venue as they wouldn't be allowed to have any public entertainment at all - again, that's something different but always worth checking on if you're hiring a venue.

[Jim - Scotland's Party DJ]

I had something similar a couple of years ago, the venue in question had their licence revoked 4 days before the wedding. I spoke to the licencing office at my local council (not the one that revoked the licence) and they told me that if I was an invited guest supplling music for free than the licence would not be needed, so our way around this was for the bride to cancel me in writing as per T&C thus I get paid cancellation fee and they then invited me as a guest of the wedding. Hope that helps.

Interesting way to get around it.

The only advice I can give to the OP is to contact the venue and find out the exact details behind the situation otherwise you're just guessing. At the very least you'll have a much better idea of how big a headache the thing is and whether it's worth pursuing or politely passing up.

[hammy]

I did a wedding in a barn in Kent and the website states " No amplified music allowed" I had a full set up that night, So yes check with the venue.