Wedding Speech
 

For any of you who have gotten married, did you give a speech at your wedding? I hear mixed things that some say you don't have to, and others say its rude not to, so I just wanted to see what everyone did at their own wedding.

Heavens, no.

Nope. My best man gave such a great speech, the DJ offered him an MC job on the spot, though.

?? Actually, I don't think I've been at a wedding where the bride/groom have given a speech.. best man, maid of honor sure but, the bride & groom? Nope..

Best Man and/or Maid of Honor only.

I've only seen/done best man.

As far as thanking people for coming, that's what you do when you go around to each of the tables at the reception and visit with people. You should definitely do that, especially if people traveled to come to the wedding. Otherwise, you''ll barely have time to grab a bite between pictures and visiting with everyone.

Yeah, I didn't remember any other Bride and Groom giving a speech. Maybe at the Rehearsal dinner, one of them got up and thanked everyone, but it wasn't a long drawn out speech.

Has anyone heard of the B&G giving a speech? I am the worst public speaker, I lose control of my bowels if I speak in public.

I gave a short one at the rehersal dinner. Wife spoke at the reception.

Hope you're never the best man...!

I'm pretty much the same way, but I did give a little speech at the rehearsal dinner. Basically just a big thank you to everyone that made the trip out to Vegas to be part of the wedding.

We got up and gave a quick speech thanking our folks and the bridal party, but the main speeches were done by relatives, the wife's maid of honour and my best woman.

PLEASE!
I really don't like when after the Best Man gives his toast they open up the floor to others in the wedding party or even other wedding guests who want to say some nice words about the couple. It's a nice sentiment, but always ends up dragging on waaaaay too long.

I did say a few words of thanks at the rehearsal dinner, but I've never heard of a couple speaking at their wedding reception.

I gave one at the rehearsal dinner also.

Agreed. That is how it was at my wedding and every other wedding I've ever been to.

Rehearsal dinner - Yes.

Wedding - No.

I gave a small speech at the rehearsal dinner, but it was the best man who did the speech at the reception. When I was a best man for him, I did the same.

Same here, small speech at rehersal. Wouldn't even think of doing it at the wedding.

"True love is hard to find, sometimes you think you have true love and then you catch the early flight home from San Diego and a couple of nude people jump out of your bathroom blindfolded like a goddamn magic show ready to double team your girlfriend..."

What my friend here is trying to say is that love is blind.....

So at the rehearsal dinner a small thank you should be said is the general consensus, and maybe an anecdote about trouts?

I am trying to set it up so I can do this with the backdrop of SD in the patriotic undies, which I am sure would go over well.

Woohoo...2 more posts and I am a Grizzled Veteran.

I can not stress this strongly enough for anyone who missed it the first time: do not turn the reception into open mike night.

I was at a wedding on the weekend that did this, and as always it was awful.

I am really glad and proud to be here tonight. I am glad to see that gottimd's dad made it out here. That's awesome, I haven't seen him in, like, eight years. That's great, congratulations.
True love is hard to find. Sometimes you think you have true love, and then you take the early flight home from San Diego and a couple of nude people jump out of your bathroom blind folded like a goddam magic show ready to double-team your girlfriend...

I love you dad!

awesome.

damnit! G.W. has more time to post stuff on this board than I do.

Also, I agree with the concensus, no need for the groom to give a speech at the wedding.

I was my brother's best man at his wedding. After my speech went down, and the rest of the celebration went on as expected (READ: me getting completely hammered at the bar after my speech ended), my brother and his then-wife gave a brief speech thanking the right people for being there. If he had went too far with it, or too many people spoke, yeah...it would've been too much. But it didn't happen. I guess the best advice to give is to know who you plan on having speaking at your wedding. If you have faith that they will carry out THE HONOR rightfully, don't worry about it and just go on with enjoying the experience.

EDIT: To remove drunken rambling.

Boy...we sure do weddings differently up here. Every wedding I've been to the B&G have given a speech...including my own. It's usually more along the lines of thanking everybody for being there and any other special thank yous you want to get out there...usually pretty quick. Heck, most of the time the parents of the B&G usually get up to say a few words after the best man and maid of honour have had their go. And to be honest, at most of the weddings I've been to, I didn't mind the speeches at all as long as I had the foresight to load up on drinks prior to them starting.

(trying to remember since the quote isn't on imdb)

I think what judicial clerk is trying to say is that true love is blind. blah.. I love you gottimd. I'm not a speaker, I'm not a speaker.

I've never heard of a groom giving a speech. Now, nearly seven years after my own wedding, you've got me worried that I breached some protocol.

It may have happened at weddings I was at, I'm generally too drunk by the time the speeches start to have much of a clue who I am never mind who the boring jerk speaking is, so I'm no expert.

Best Man and Father of the Bride. That's the speakers I'd expect.

radii and I both gave speeches or "toasts" at our reception. My father spoke before dinner was served and welcomed everyone. After dinner and some dancing, the Best Man and Maid of Honor gave their toasts, then we each said something - mainly thanking our friends and family who had traveled (over 70% of our guests were from out of town) and thanking my parents. Radii actually gave a really sweet speech about how my parents and how much he likes them and feels as if he was included in our family from the beginning. Of course the irony is that this was given AFTER his parents and family left the reception early...but of course that is another story :)

I spoke at the rehearsal dinner (briefly, and gave my half of the bridal party their thank-you gifts then), the BM, MoH, and father of the bride spoke at the reception.

Heh. Try this one.

The bride, during the actual *wedding*, SANG. A full song.

I was already not wanting to be there. That just made it ten times worse.

I gave a speech at a wedding for a friend of mine after the best man gave his speech.

My speech was better. I felt a little guilty about it. But, whatever.

The last wedding I went to, the best man started to give a toast but started crying pretty much before he said a word. It was his brother's wedding, so I guess he had reason to be emotional. It was half awkward, half moving. I was sitting next to the maid of honor and I asked her if she was as nervous. She just said casually said no, then when it was her turn to give a speech she strode to the other side of the room with a binder, looking all weirdly professional and unmoved and sang an opera as her speech. Since I know she's not particularly close to the bride -- they're sisters who can't stand each other, it was especially sucky that she used the moment to show off her singing "abilities."

I had to give a speech at my borther's wedding. It was painful, oh so painful. I had nothing prepared since I wasn't even the one who was supposed to do it. It lasted about 15 seconds I think, tops.

I think we opted, just for me to give a brief thanks to everyone at the rehearsal dinner, nothing more. I can't believe its this weekend, damn time flew.

Reading this thread makes me happy that

a) I'm already married

b) we had a very private ceremony and reception

Honestly, I'll never understand the fascination with weddings. It's not THAT day that's so important, it's every day thereafter. At least, that's what I'm going to tell my daughter when she wants me to pay for her wedding.

Agreed! My wedding was done in a Judge's chambers with my mother-in-law and my 8 month old daughter. It was so nice and easy. Hell, we didnt even get our rings until 3 years later....
:D

I wish it were that easy. Damn women want some elaborate event. I told her from the get go, lets just go somewhere and do it, and not plan this whole event, and save the money for a house. This has become the biggest debacle and most stressful time managing the money as it goes to every vendor. You couldn't even imagine the total cost this is running up to. Ridiculous.

The speech is traditionally the job of the best man. I have been to at least 20 weddings, and the groom has never given a speech, always the best man (actually a toast, but it usually ends up being a speech - limit him to one minute, and prohibit the words, "I have known gottimd since...").

A note of caution, PLEASE don't cave to PC politics and let the maid of honor also give a speech, especially if she will be given alcohol between the ceremony and reception. The last thing the world needs is another alcohol fueled "I love the bride so much, she is my best friend/sister/cousin" sobfest.

Ever seen the show Bridezilla? I can imagine........ :eek:

Anyone have any good ideas for songs to be introduced to? The soon to be wife and I are sitting here trying to think, and we are stumped. We are having a Motown Band. She said, "Hey, why don't you go on that football site you are always on and ask them, and tell Cuckoo I said hello."

:D

Tell her I have no ideas. Anything I'd say would be of the "smartass" variety, and I figure it best to just spare you/her of that.

;)

We came into "I do, I do, I do, I do, I do" by ABBA (cheezy, I know! But I love that song!)...if you are having a motown band how about "This will be an everlasting love"? I don't know who sings it though...it's a classic though, most people know it.

For the past 4 weddings I have been to I have sang at them. They let me sing Sweet Caroline and I bring down the house!

Don't sweat it about the speech - I just used an old Lincoln speech and spiced it up with a couple of Chris Rock jokes. They ate it up.
I've always felt the best entrance song is "Fuck like a beast" by W.A.S.P.
Not so much for weddings, but maybe if you're looking for like an entrance song for the honeymoon. I'm just throwing out ideas here.

Blue Rodeo's "What Am I Doing Here" was one of my suggestions...the wife wasn't very impressed. She did giggle though.

Hopefully our wedding is like this: