How Not to Hire a
Band for Your Corporate Event

There is a particular kind of disaster that unfolds when a corporate event planner — well-meaning, under pressure, working off a spreadsheet — books a “Vegas band” off a Google search. It begins on the day of the event, when the band shows up with the wrong PA, the wrong song list, and a frontman whose stage name they could not pull up on their phone six hours earlier. It ends with a CFO standing in the parking lot at 11:47 PM, asking the planner what exactly was paid for.

I have witnessed this scene roughly forty times. Forty different planners, forty different ballrooms, the same parking lot, the same question. This essay is for them. For the planner who is about to make this mistake, for the assistant who has been asked to “find a band for Thursday,” for the senior VP who has decided to handle this one personally because how hard could it be.

Reader, it is harder than you think. But the mistakes are predictable, and the predictable mistakes are avoidable.

Mistake one: you booked the marketplace, not the musicians.

The first thing to understand is that most “Vegas bands” on the internet do not exist. What you found on Google is a marketplace listing — a description of a band, a few promotional photos (often three or four years old), and a quote-request form. When you fill out the form, the marketplace sends your request to a roster of available musicians, who put together a band for your date based on who is free. The “band” you booked is sometimes a real ensemble that plays together every week. More often, it is five musicians who met each other at 4 PM in the parking lot of your venue.

This is not, in itself, fatal. Pickup bands in Las Vegas are populated by some of the most accomplished sight-readers in the country. The musicianship is rarely the problem. The problem is the relationship: nobody on the bandstand has watched anyone else perform under pressure, nobody has rehearsed transitions, nobody knows whether the singer is going to take the bridge up a step.

When the marketplace tells you their band is “the one in the photos,” ask which exact musicians will be at your event. Ask if they have performed together in the last six months. If the answer is unclear, you have not booked a band. You have booked an audition. What you actually want is a Las Vegas corporate band whose exact members you can confirm in advance — the same people, every gig, who already know each other’s habits cold.

Mistake two: you negotiated on price before you knew what was included.

Every “Vegas band” quote on the internet leaves something out. The most common omissions, in order: the PA system, the sound engineer, the backline, the learning fee for special requests, the cartage, the gratuity expectation, the early-arrival fee for soundcheck, the dressing-room rider.

A $4,800 band with no PA is not a deal. It is the down payment on a separate vendor relationship with an AV company who will charge you $3,200 to deliver and run a sound system that the band will then complain about all night. Always ask: “What is the all-in number for this band, on my date, in this room, including sound, lighting, and the engineer to run it?” Get that number in writing. The right answer is a single quote with sound included and no hidden fees — one number, one point of contact, nothing waiting to surprise you on the invoice. If the vendor cannot give you that number, they have not done this enough times to deserve your booking.

Mistake three: you asked for the song list and accepted what they sent.

Every band has a song list. Most of it is filler — songs in the catalog they technically know but have not performed in the last year. The list you actually want is “what they played on their last six gigs.” Ask for that. A real band can produce it. A pickup band cannot, because the gigs have been with different sets of musicians.

This is also the moment to ask about your specific song requests. Custom learning takes time and costs money. A reputable band will tell you the fee — usually $200 to $400 per song — and will guarantee a rehearsal before your event. If they will “absolutely no problem” learn six songs for free with no rehearsal commitment, you are going to hear those six songs played for the first time in front of your guests, and your guests will know.

Mistake four: you skipped the references.

Every entertainment vendor has references. The bad ones will send you a list of three names you cannot Google. The good ones will send you actual planners with email addresses at real companies and you can call them. Call them. Ask the same five questions:

1. Did the band show up with the musicians they promised?
2. Did the sound work, and who set it up?
3. Did the bandleader manage the timeline of the event, or did you?
4. What surprised you, good or bad?
5. Would you book them again at the same price?

The answers tell you everything. The fifth question, especially. A planner who says “yes but only because it was a fight” is telling you about a mediocre band with a difficult vendor relationship. A planner who says “yes, immediately, I already have” is telling you the truth.

What to do instead.

Book a band you can name. Insist on knowing the specific musicians who will perform. Demand an all-in price that includes sound and the engineer. Pay for a rehearsal of any custom song. Call three references. Sign a contract that names the bandleader as the single point of contact for your event.

If you cannot do those five things — because the vendor cannot or will not let you — keep looking. The right band is the one for whom these requests are easy. They are not surprised; they expect you to ask. They send the references unprompted. They show up to soundcheck early, they manage the timeline so you do not have to, and at 11:47 PM, when the dance floor is full and the CFO is asking who booked this, the bandleader is already shaking the CFO’s hand.

I would write more, but the room is filling and I am due on stage in twenty minutes. The CFO, you should know, tips well.

Lisa Marie Smith leads Live Music Society, the Las Vegas corporate and wedding band she runs with Isaac Tubb, and founded LMS Entertainment. She writes The Column bi-weekly.