How Much Should You Charge for a Wedding Performance in the UK?

Ask this question in any singers' group and you will get silence, jokes, or "depends". All useless when a family is on the phone asking for your rate. Here is a straight framework instead — factors, structure, and script.

Why nobody quotes one number

Because the same evening can genuinely be worth very different amounts. The honest variables:

• Set length and format. Forty-five minutes of ambient ghazals over dinner is a different product from four hours carrying a full function into a dance floor.
• Accompaniment. Solo with tracks, or with tabla, dholak and keys? Musicians are paid by you — your quote must carry them.
• Day and season. Saturdays in wedding season carry premiums; a Tuesday mehndi does not.
• Travel and setup. Distance, load-in time, your own PA versus the venue's.
• Your pull. Once families book you by name — because they heard you at another wedding — you have pricing power. Until then you are competing on reliability and repertoire breadth.

Structure the quote, not just the number

Experienced performers quote a package: "£X for up to N hours, including PA and travel within M miles; £Y per additional hour; musicians at £Z each." Three reasons: it prevents the endless "can you also…" creep, it makes comparisons harder (you are no longer a number beside someone else's number), and it looks professional — which itself justifies rates.

Always take a deposit — 20–30% to hold the date is standard and filters out non-serious enquiries. Track what remains: fee, advance received, balance due on the night. (Melafz's gig cards calculate the balance automatically, and generate the invoice — because the family's uncle will ask for one.)

Raising your rate

The market tells you when. If you are booked most weekends of the season, you are underpriced — raise the rate for new enquiries and let existing bookings honour the old one. Reputation compounds: every wedding is an audition for three more, which is also why the quality of your setlist is a pricing strategy, not just an artistic one.

The script

When asked your rate, never answer with a bare number. "For a full evening with my usual musicians, packages start at £X — tell me about the event and I'll quote it properly." You sound like a professional with a price list, because now you are one.