Wedding Speech, One Week Time Table

Wedding Speeches - The One Week Timetable

I have one week to prepare for my wedding speech - what do I need to do?

First of all, you might be sitting there thinking: "How on earth am I going to do this in a week?" On the other hand, you might be thinking: "Do it in a week? No problem."

If you belong to the first category I would say: "Stay calm, what you have to do is possible." If you belong to the second category (although if you do, you may be unlikely to be reading this!), I would say: "That's fine, but please make sure that you have a full appreciation of the different elements of the task in hand.

Unless you have already planned what to say, the first thing to do, if you haven't already, is to go to our website and get the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets be it one for a Groom, Best Man or Father of the Bride. You will be able to work best with the pack if you print it off.

Plan your Preparations Next, consider your schedule for the week ahead.

How much free time do you have? Is it spaced evenly throughout the week? When can you rely on not being interrupted? Are your lunch hours available? Is it possible for you to book a day off work?

You need to set aside time to assess your Master Class material and make your selections from it, time to think up your own personal material, time to collate it all together and order it, time to get it onto cards (which you need to schedule in time to buy), and time to practise.

At the start of the week prepare a schedule charting exactly when you will do what and for how long. As the week progresses, keep track of how you're doing; if you lose time on one activity you'll have to speed up somewhere else. However please don't worry; there has been many a wedding speaker who has been in this situation and has succeeded massively, especially those who have been smart enough to take advantage of our Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets !!

Work out What to say

You can give a completely successful wedding speech simply by using one of the examples in our speeches packs. You can improve on it by adding two or three personal reminiscences, thus customising it for your particular wedding and guests.

So, you have your pack. Read through it - all of it (I know there's a lot, but it's a great opportunity to practise your speed reading!) and highlight jokes, quotes and toasts that appeal to you.

Whenever you have a spare moment, consider your Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets; remember that it is quite alright to choose sections from different speeches to create your own composite speech.

As you walk or commute around trawl through your memories for anecdotes etc which you can use. Carry a notebook so that you can write them down straight away. Don't leave it at the office! Also, do read the help files on our website; there is a great deal of useful advice on matters ranging from preparing your notes to practising and control of nerves.

Practice and Rehearse And lastly, don't panic. And to help you not to panic, be sure to get some practising in - as much as you can find time for.

Lots of practise won't make a bad speech good, but no practise is likely to make an otherwise good speech bad. No-one wants this to happen, least of all you.
Practise in front of a mirror and pretend that you are there at the top table, delivering to a packed house before taking your seat to massive applause.

If you follow these guidelines plus those in our Help Files and choose material from our pack which you genuinely like, backing it up with two or three solid personal contributions, it is difficult to see anything stopping you from being an immense success.

Bruno Barton :)

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
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Wedding Speech, One Month Time Table

Wedding Speeches - The One Month Timetable

I have one month to prepare for my wedding speech - what do I need to do?

You will save a great deal of time and the quality of your material will be assured if you buy the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets Today !! click this link to find out why today is your best time to lock in to our great deal !!

In this article I assume that you are joining us today :)

If your choice is to write the whole of your speech yourself without our material, you must allow extra time to find or create you own humour and linking sentences and to craft the tone and style appropriately to your personality, audience and the occasion.

Your first action, then, is to download the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets.

Once you have accessed your speech pack, read through the 5 speeches provided, decide whether you will use one speech as it is, or if you will mix and match from the 5 speeches.

Read through the extra jokes, quotes and toasts and put a tick beside the ones you like.

Spend a little time collating extra information from your memories and research with friends and relatives, and jot down any jokes that you have heard which are appropriate.

Also, do have a go at creating some original humour for the personalities involved in your wedding. This may not be as difficult for you as it sounds. Please see my earlier Bruno's Blog Posts for a whole series on this subject.

Decide on your 'final' material for the speech, bearing in mind you only need 15 or so snippets or jokes to fill 5 minutes when wrapped with linking material.

If you are unsure of any of this material you may wish at this stage to bounce it off someone to ensure that it is inoffensive to everybody.

The next stage is to arrange the material in a logical order, interspersing it with the material chosen from the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets.

Now work on the exact wording you will be using for your opening. It is great to start off almost any speech in any circumstance with humour. If you can get them to laugh near the beginning it relaxes both yourself and the audience. If you can do this, everything else should be plain sailing.

So choose your opening remarks very carefully indeed; get an early laugh and you're on your way.

I recommend choosing your conclusion next, so that you are establishing the beginning and the end first, making them witty, sincere and profound. Your speech is like a bridge crossing a river; it needs solid foundations before the graceful arch can be constructed.

In writing the links you need words and phrases which smoothly progress from one passage to the next. Use transitional phrases like 'by the way' 'which reminds me' or 'changing the subject completely' and 'which leads me onto'.

Conclude you speech with a toast, chosen from those provided in the speech pack or one of your own.

Now put your speech away for a couple of days. Come back to it refreshed and go through it with a fine toothcomb. Do you still find the humour funny? Are you happy with the choice of linking words? How about the exact wording of the jokes and anecdotes?

Stringently remove and replace less effective words throughout the speech.

Put the wedding speech away for a couple of days.

Do the same again until you are fully happy with the material.

When satisfied with the content, you will need to reduce it to a set of notes on cards. Full guidelines are given in the "Free Help" section of our website. These guidelines have been developed from my own experiences over nearly 20 years as a speaker. They work for me, they will work for you too.

When you have your notes, I urge you to practise, practise, practise as much as you can. As you are preparing several weeks in advance, you have the opportunity to rehearse to such an extent that on the day you will know your material backwards. Make the most of this! Again the place to look for guidelines is the "Practise" section of our "Free Help" page.

I hope this all goes really well for you. If you follow this advice, it will.

Bruno Barton :)

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
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HELP! Wedding Speech One Day Time Table

HELP! I've only got one day! Wedding Speeches - The One Day Timetable

So you've only got today to produce an effective, stimulating, entertaining and sincere wedding speech. Are you panicking?

Don't !! We are able to provide you with all the ingredients you will need to do well tomorrow.

The first thing to consider is whether you can take any time off work - the more the better. But even if you end up with only an hour to produce a few words, using that time in preparations will definitely help you.

Step by step, First - Download the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets from http://www.fineweddingspeeches.com/

Even if your available time is tiny, you now have 5 suitable wedding speeches, and you can:

choose which of our five speeches suits you best and use it "as is" except for the insertion of the correct Bride and Groom's names throughout. Each one of our speeches will stand up in front of any audience.

If you can engineer more time, all well and good. Search through your memory for an appropriate anecdote or two to personalise the speech a little. Use your time to intersperse the material into your chosen speech, perhaps with selected material from the jokes and quotes and toasts collections.

Prepare your speaker's notes: Produce your final notes - type or write them on to cards. If none are available use paper, but not full sheets of A4. With these in front of you any otherwise imperceptible shake of your hands due to nerves will be magnified out of all proportion by the windsock-like flapping of the paper. Rather, trim the sheets across the middle to make A5 sheets and use those.

When writing notes, never split a sentence over two cards - you will find yourself stopping in the middle of a crucial statement or joke and searching wildly for its punchline.

Make sure that the cards are in the right order - number them and either staple them together or punch a hole and use a treasury tag.

Print off / photocopy a second set and keep it in your pocket, just in case of accidental loss of the master set.

Rehearse !! Do try to find the time to read through the speech out loud at least once - more if you can. Practise will help your confidence and make the occasion less of an ordeal.

Deliver your wedding speech

When you stand up to "deliver" to "perform" your speech: don't belt through the speech through out of control nerves - breathe deeply, force yourself to proceed through the speech at a measured pace with plenty of pauses to allow the audience to mull over your words, anticipate humour and appreciate your sincerity.

I can't over emphasise the importance of refraining from alcohol before the speech - if you are tipsy you will be an embarrassment to everyone, particularly yourself. Lay off the beer etc altogether until afterwards.

A closing thought: lots of people will probably offer you conflicting advice about the delivery and content of your speech - by all means consider what they say but don't be distracted from the steps you find here.

And finally, my best wishes for resounding success and a happy day.

Bruno Barton

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
No part of this article may be copied, transmitted, stored or used in anyway without the express permission of finespeeches.com. The adoption of any of our RSS feeds includes with it our express permission to receive and or display our unaltered content.

Creating Original Humour, Lesson Eight, Mind Mapping

Creating Original Humour for your Wedding Speech, Lesson Eight, Mind Mapping

Welcome to this month's Bruno's Blog, in which we explore the use of mind mapping to create wedding speech humour.

We are going to illustrate this technique for the wedding reception of a fictional couple, John and Miriam. John has Swiss parentage, plays the violin and enjoys Strauss waltzes and sailing.

The first thing to do is to brainstorm these subjects via mind maps. We'll tackle sailing first; next, Strauss; and finally, Switzerland.

Click below for Mind Map "Brainstorms" examples...

- Sailing
- Strauss
- Switzerland

Please note that these mind maps serve only to illustrate the method.

When I am actually creating humour I brainstorm far more information onto the mind maps than is shown, and create a mindmap for every subject under consideration.

It is not unusual for me to spend a considerable length of time searching through ten or more sheets of A4 paper filled with bubbles and links. Applying the method to this extent always produces numerous ideas for humour, several of which are normally considered excellent by my customers.

Having created these mind maps we scour them for links between subjects on the individual mind maps and between subjects on different mind maps. Amazing as it may seem, wherever there is a link there is a joke.

It will probably not be possible to generate a good joke out of every link, but please be open minded to the good and the bad. As I've said before you need to create a certain amount of chaff to get a few grains of wheat.

The links I can see are as follows (see the green highlighting):

Click below for Mind Map "Connections/links"

- Sailing
- Strauss
- Switzerland

The next step is to write down the connected subjects and convert them into jokes using the tips in my earlier articles on creating wedding speech humour.

I end up with the following; which I can tie into the wedding, many others come to mind but are not listed as being either inappropriate for a wedding reception or just not relevant to the wedding couple, families or guests.

John is of course very keen on Johann Strauss and his music. Strauss came from Vienna, a place famous for white stallions, a fairground with a giant ferris wheel and the film The Third Man.

Like John, Strauss came from a musically talented family: Johann senior, Johann junior and Levi, who was clearly the third man.

John and Miriam enjoy old time ballroom dancing, but moving on just for a moment ...

... you know the fairground in Vienna? It reminds me of "The Waltzers" - remember them? ... the fairground ride which twirls you round-about and violently from side to side? ...

... well, Miriam confided in me once that dancing with John was a bit like that. ... And has asked me to warn you all to stand well clear when she and John lead the wedding dances later on.

As you probably know John enjoys Straus waltzes and playing the violin: Waltzes of course have 3 beats to the bar, so if Strauss had a car you could imagine his number plate being "123 123"; as for the composer Sousa, he wrote marches so his number plate would be "12 12"; meanwhile, Wagner's (Vargner) would be determined by his answer to the question: "Do you spell your name with a V?" To which he would say: "Nein W" (9 W).

I can say at this point that John, as a fiddle player, is saving up for registration "V10 LIN". (Oops, the "Rule of Three" suggests that I've got one too many, so I might cut one of the first three items, but I'll keep the last because it is most relevant to the wedding.)

When John inherited Swiss nationality from his mother a few years ago, the prospect of national service didn't bother him - after all, it's just a bit of ski-ing, which is great fun.

But my concern for the Swiss militia is the tools they are given to fight with: a Swiss army knife. It's a good job they haven't fought any wars for 500 years, because anyone with anything as simple as a catapult would take them to the cleaners.

It is John's Swiss heritage that has given him his immense musical ability, and which has actually won him the hand and heart of his beautiful wife today; she was smitten when she heard him playing The William Tell Overture on his alphorn. Incidentally, did you know that the only reason William Tell shot the apple off his son's head was to put it in his muesli; which of course is the only breakfast John ever eats.

John has recently taken up sailing; I believe that this is to make up for the numerical deficiencies of the Swiss navy. There was the time he took Miriam out in his boat and the weather suddenly became choppy; Miriam was less than impressed with him when he started "yodelling" over the side of the boat.

The Swiss are known for cuckoo clocks, precision and accuracy - their buses and trains are always on time and dovetail together beautifully. What we have here is something else that dovetails together beautifully, another perfect connection! the wedding of John and Miriam. Etc etc.

It takes a little effort to get going with Mind Mapping, but it's well worth it, because with a bit of practise you'll be able to come up with jokes on any subject.

Mind maps are a technique that you will find easier and more effective, the more you practice them, they are frequently used at work and in business. Using mind mapping for your wedding speech may just be the start of learning the technique for other aspects of life.

I wish you every success on the wedding day.

Bruno Barton

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
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Creating Original Humour, Lesson Six, Rhyme & Acronyms

Creating Original Humour for your Wedding Speeches, Lesson Six, Rhyme and Acronyms

Hello folks and welcome to this weeks article, where we look at the creation of humour using rhyme and acronyms.

First of all: rhyme. This can be an amusing way to engage your wedding speech audience.

When giving an after dinner speech I like to start by telling the audience something relevant to them before continuing with the main thrust of my speech.
For instance if I am speaking at a Rotary Club I tell them about the time I was taken on to entertain at a Rotary-organised event called the Belbroughton Scarecrow Weekend (where people dress as scarecrows and raise money for charity).

I go on to tell them that I only accepted the job because I thought it was the Belbroughton Hair Grow Weekend. As I am bald this generally raises my first laugh.

So how do you go about inventing rhyme jokes? As ever, begin by brainstorming everything that you know about the Bride, Groom, their hobbies etc.

Next, go out and buy a rhyming dictionary. (Mine cost me £8.99). This is a useful tool for the future if you plan to write poems or songs, but in the short term it could provide you with a great laugh or two to enrich your speech.

Let's look at a few examples:

Example 1) Take a Groom called John who happens to enjoy the great outdoors, particularly gold panning holidays in the Rockies. Bearing in mind that you are allowed to bend the truth on these occasions, we could relate a tale about gold panning using a non-stick frying pan (possibly taking in the Groom's cooking ability at the same time).

Example 2) Refer to the trusty rhyming dictionary. As Christian names are not generally in the index we need to look up a word that "John" rhymes with, such as "on".

Scanning through the rhymes for "on" and pulling out relevant ones could easily lead to the following; "Ladies and gentlemen, following (my story about gold panning etc) I'd like to re-mane John as Teflon John from the Yukon."

A similar process leads to:

No sleeve Steve from Tel Aviv - useful for a vest-wearing kibbutz-visiter.

Bonehead Fred from Birkenhead - for a scouser who keeps his hair cropped
Etc etc

I hope you get the idea. Investigate the names of all the relevant wedding participants: the Bride and Groom's Christian and surnames and their nicknames, their home towns and their jobs etc. You may come up with an absolute corker.

Acronyms Moving on to acronyms, I suppose the first thing for me to do is define what an acronym is. It's a word or phrase the letters of which each stand for another word.

Eg: DIY - Do It Yourself. Incidentally, I don't do DIY, I do GMI - Get Men In.
Which is both a rhyme and and acronym.

More examples:
GOLFER - Groing Old Looking For Early Retirement
LOMBARD - Lots Of Money But A Right Dipstick

Once again, brainstorming is the starting point. Fill a page or two with notes about the couple - names, interests, personal histories.

Spend some time creating acronyms from them. Here are a few to start you off:
WOOF - Well Off Older Folk (good if either the bride or groom has a dog)
SITCOM - Single Income Two Children Oppressive Mortgage
HUSBAND - Huge Ugly Squat Bogeyman Acquires Nubile Damsel
BRIDE - Best Ruddy Idea Dave'S Envisaged
TAFFY - Totally Affable Financially Fantastic Yuppie
BRUMMIE - Big Robust Unassuming Midland Man Into Escapology (useful if Groom has a history of being locked in places)
JOCK - Jolly Old Can Of Kippers
GROOM - Grimy Richard Organises Opportunistic Marriage

I should say that your acronym or rhyme needs to say something about the Bride or Groom which echoes what you are saying about them anyway - repeating again or adding to it in a witty way. Repetition of a theme can be very funny.

For example, after relating a story about the Groom being locked in a department store loo for 3 hours before breaking out, you can say (if he's a Brummie):
"And so you see it's true that Tom is a true Brummie, by which I mean that he is a big robust unassuming midland man into escapology."

I wish you well in your voyage of joke discovery and know that if you have bought the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets and applied my tips you will be well on the way to success on the Big Day.

Bruno Barton


Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
No part of this article may be copied, transmitted, stored or used in anyway without the express permission of finespeeches.com. The adoption of any of our RSS feeds includes with it our express permission to receive and or display our unaltered content.

Creating Original Humour, Lesson Five, Anagrams

Creating Original Humour for your Wedding Speech, Lesson Five, Using Anagrams

In this article I demonstrate how to create and use anagrams for a wedding speech to further enhance your armoury of humour creating skills.

Anagrams can be very funny and a well chosen one can go down a treat.

Anagrams are a rich load to tap into: anagrams of the Groom's name, the Bride's name, the Bride and Groom's Christian names, the Groom's football team , the parents names, the towns where the families live, the location of the wedding (town, venue) etc are all appropriate subjects for an anagram.

There are a couple of ways that you can create them:-

The first, the hardest, is to toy with the word / phrase / name you wish to anagramise with nothing more than a piece of paper, a pen and your brain.
The other way is to use anagram-finding services on the internet, some of these are on-line others are downloadable software.

Some of the available ones are:-
WordSmith Anagram Artist, Anagram Genius

If you search for "Anagrams" or "Anagram Services online" at a search engine you will find many online sources of anagrams. Some are simple to use as well as free but leave you having to search all the letter combinations to identify useful or funny ones.

This can be extremely laborious, and I would recommend not being caught up with such a service, and instead using more sophisticated products.

The one which I like best is Anagram Genius.

You can download a free version which is quite serviceable or pay 30 dollars or so for the Gold version which is excellent for our purposes. During the rest of this discussion I am referring to Anagram Genius, but the same methods work with any anagram service.

Please bear in mind that for our purposes an anagram doesn't have to be absolutely exactly correct - if it suits your comic purposes by all means change the odd letter - if done sparingly it is very unlikely that anyone will challenge you on this, even if they notice.

However you may well feel more satisfied by a completely accurate anagram. Fortunately it is possible to make some tremendously funny or appropriate anagrams.

This is how I do it:-

Your first step is to list the names, ideas etc which you intend to anagramise.
To achieve useable anagrams you have to try different permutations - for instance "Mark and Anne" on its own might not give the software enough to work on, but try it first and then try Mark and Anne Smith (for example), and if you don't get anything useable from that expand it a little more, eg: Anne and Mark Smith Aston Villa fans.

Try the name of the church where the wedding is taking place, the name of the reception venue, the Bride's maiden name, etc, etc

An effective anagram program will:-

sort the anagrams in order of %age effectiveness, ie best anagrams first use artificial intelligence to arrange each anagram into roughly grammatical sentences, and includes slang words (but be sure not to use undue coarse language!)

In other words it can do a lot of the 'donkey work' for you, by identifying the anagrams which are most likely to be useful.

So, plug in the name / phrase you wish to anagramise. But what are you looking for?

Ideally a connection with a facet of the Groom's / Brides personality or personal history.

Anagram examples
Here are a couple of examples taken from speeches written for Sparkling Speech (my tailored speech-writing web service) customers.

[1] I wrote a speech for one Best Man, whose best friend, the Groom, had, for mist-shrouded historical reasons, the nickname Dom. The Best Man was delighted when I shared with him the choice nugget that Dom's full name was an anagram of "warm old sniveller", and with my suggestion that in his speech he should propose a re-name to "Wos".

[2] Another customer, a Groom, was a staunch member of an Elim Pentecostal Church known for their passionate singing. Anagram Genius told me that "Elim Pentecostal Church" was an anagram of "ace tonsil temple", a fact which went down a storm when he delivered his speech.

[3] For another example, consider a Bride who makes a habit of collecting shopping coupons and is getting married at St Thomas' Church, Bournville. What could be more appropriate than to discover that she should be wooed by "voucher charms not bullshit"?

[4] A good prospect is the Groom's / Bride's favourite sporting team. Try just the first part of the name, then if that yields nothing, add the rest of the name. For instance, try "Manchester United" and if that fails, try "Manchester United Football Club", etc

[5] Using anagram creation software I have found that "Aston Villa Football Club" is an anagram of "full vocal slob battalion," "Manchester United " is an anagram of "dream stench unite", and "Manchester United Football Club" is an anagram of "accentuated run-of-the-mill blobs."

I have to say that it takes a little time to find anagrams like these, but I would say that if you have seven or eight names / combinations to search under, you'll probably be able to do them all in a couple of hours.

Anagram Genius has a couple of extra features, one of which is its archive collection of the very best anagrams created, arranged under headings as diverse as sport, TV and politics. It's well worth having a quick look to see if there's anything there you can use.

One example: "Manchester United footballer David Beckham" is an anagram of "Man, the bloke blundered! Fetch Victoria Adams!"

You can use anagram software to create entertaining aliases. For example, if your name happened to be Slobodan Milosevic and you were female, you might decide on an alias of Miss Cleo Viola Bond.

One final note on anagrams: don't overload your speech with them. I think the rule of three applies well here.

Use them sparingly, no more than three and if you use more than one try to use anagrams that complement and support each other.

And remember, a lot of work has been done for you in the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets :)

Bruno Barton


Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
No part of this article may be copied, transmitted, stored or used in anyway without the express permission of finespeeches.com. The adoption of any of our RSS feeds includes with it our express permission to receive and or display our unaltered content.

Creating Original Humour, Lesson Four, Using History

Creating Original Humour for your Wedding Speeches, Lesson Four, Using History


This article deals with the use of information from history to make your wedding speech humorous in a way that is linked to the people at the wedding. This can add variety and interest making your speech special.

For the effective use of history in a speech you need a source of historical facts, arranged by date of the year. This enables you to derive speech enhancing observations and humour relating to, for example, the date of the wedding or the Groom's or the Bride's birth date.

Finding historical informationFortunately there are several such sources available on the internet.

The easiest way to find one that you like is to go to a search engine and search for keywords such as:-

"Any day in history" "today in history" "on this day". These links will take you to the appropriate google results page :).

The one which I prefer is Any-day in History, available at Scopesys. I found everything that I wanted to help writing my speeches, and it was easy to use.

If you want to use this service you will have to use the link above or type in "www.scopesys.com/anyday" in full in your internet browser, because there is (currently) no link from the home page to the anyday in history page where you can select the relevant.

The rest of this article will describe the principles of using historic information, but the example methods refer to scopesys.com.

You can apply the principles using a historical source of your choice.

Simply plug in any date and three sets of information appear:
first a list of people throughout history who share that birth date, next a list of people who have died on that date (I suggest NOT using this list for wedding humour) and finally a list of historical events which have happened on that date.

Identifying useful historic material. What we are looking for is any historical information which can be related in some way to the people involved in the wedding, particularly the Bride and Groom.

For instance:-
Things that echo one or the other of their personal characteristics or interests, items which are similar to them in some way or which maybe are even totally opposite to them, or perhaps something that inadvertently speaks about marriage in a way which is interesting or amusing.

Examples - using history for humourLet's plug in my birthday (11th April) and see what we can make of it all.

[1]Scanning through the birthday sharers, we see that I share my birthday with two great cricketers, Arthur Shrewsbury, who dominated English batting in the late 19th century, and Everton Mattis, a West Indies batsman in the 80's.

Clearly with such a pedigree of cricketing excellence born on that day, how could I be anything other than a world class Test cricketer?

Unfortunately I can hardly lift the bat and have been out for a duck more times than I care to mention, So in this case I can't easily draw a comparison between myself and cricketeers from history.

If I really want to include 'cricket' in my speech (perhaps because all other members of my family are keen cricketeers) I might claim that I would be as good at cricket as the rest of the family if only Nature had not gone awry given and my share of cricketing talent to these other world class cricketeers who shared my birthday.

[2]However I can draw some comfort from another two of the birthday sharers:
Nick La Rocca, a jazz composer who wrote the classic jazz tune Tiger Rag and the pop star Lisa Stansfield were born on the same date too, which clearly means that it can only be a matter of time before I and my rock band "Rancid Rabbit" make history and reach number one in the pop charts.

There is an element of truth in this: I do write pop songs and have thought of setting up a spoof band called Rancid Rabbit, but whether it'll ever happen or not I don't know.

Nevertheless, the fact that they do songs and I do songs makes the comparison relevant. Not only were we born on the same day but we are all in the same business, without doubt we are destined for the same greatness!

You don't have doubts do you? I am being flattered by the comparison.

This approach can be a nice touch for the happy couple on their wedding day.The closer I can compare the historical information to the wedding the better the impression and the more successful the humour. But please note that in the world of creative humour, even for weddings, you are allowed to stretch the truth for comic effect. As long as you don't tell a string of outright lies, no-one will mind.

[3]Looking through history for events on 11th April and relating them to a wedding on this day, I see that it is the anniversary of Napoleon's first abdication.

Never mind what the groom's real attitude to marriage has been in previous years, you can still boldly proclaim that ....

"Clearly after half a lifetime of dedicated bachelorhood, the Groom has taken a leaf out of Napoleon's book and handed over control to someone else".

Of course if the groom has really been known as a sceptic about marriage you might build in how heartened you are to see such a profound conversion in his attitudes, and charmed you are to see how eagerly he has approached his own wedding.

[4]I also notice from history, that in 1960 on this day the first weather satellite was launched, and in 1984 the crew of the Space Shuttle Challenger carried out the first in-space satellite repair.

So for the speech I can say "Looking out of the window at the weather now I think we can say it wasn't the weather satellite that they repaired!"

Obviously this only works if it is raining. If it is sunny we could say: Thank goodness they fixed it!

You may find useful comic historical snippets which you would like to use but which apply to a non-relevant date. Feel free to use them anyway. It is highly unlikely that anyone will realise, and even more unlikely that they will challenge you.

Even if they do just claim artistic licence. Alternatively if it really bothers you, just find some other historical facts and use them in conjunction with another relevant day. There is plenty of material out there!

I hope you can see my drift on this one. Given a fairly open and lateral approach to the people and events in these two listings of events from history, you should be able to find some very good wedding speech enhancing material.

Bruno Barton


Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
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Creating Original Humour, Lesson 3, Rule Of Three

Creating Original Humour for your Wedding Speech, Lesson Three: The Rule of Three

Hello folks and welcome to this lesson on how to personalise your wedding speech humour.

This time we're considering the creation of jokes using what's known in humour writing circles as The Rule of Three. This is a triple sequence which is used to increase suspense and tension with a longer build up, leading (hopefully) to an uproarious laugh at the end.

The Rule of Three has been used for centuries in creative writing of all sorts, but particularly in children's stories. For instance there's the three blind mice, the three little pigs and Goldilocks and the three bears, to mention just three (how's that for a quick rule of three!)

This device works because the audience / reader is compelled to wait for the payoff, which in the world of humour is the punchline… and not only that but is compelled to wait just the right amount of time.

Please bear in mind that the majority of your jokes should come in "singles", not "triples". But consider this: a joke in "twos" for some reason generally doesn't work - somehow the delay and correspondingly the suspense isn't long enough, and a "four" is normally far too long.

There is something about a joke set up as a three that makes it work just right. One may be funny, two isn't, four isn't, but three is. And it's generally more effective than the same joke told as a "single."

Let's illustrate this with an example. The most famous type of Rule of Three joke is the legendary: "An Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman were in a…"
Now I don't for a minute suggest that you use one of these in your wedding speech as they are generally outrageously politically incorrect.

A politically correct one however will illustrate my message nicely, even though it's as old as the hills. Don't worry, there'll be some brand new ones in a few moments.

Here goes:

An Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman were in a field. The Englishman said: "Look at that English cow over there." The Irishman said: "No, it's an Irish cow." But the Scotsman said: "Actually, you're both wrong. It's a Scottish cow. Look, it's got bagpipes under it."

Would this work as a single ?

A Scotsman was in a field and said: "Look, you can tell that's a Scottish cow because it's got bagpipes under it." I don't think so. So you can see that "tripling up" does improve this joke. (It's probably just as well!)

I'm not suggesting that you pepper your wedding speech with Rule of Three jokes, but certainly one would be a fine addition to the style and content of your speech, and maybe even two.

How do you create a Rule of Three joke?

First of all the third part needs to be funny; for that you need an element of surprise - set up the joke in the introduction, delay the surprise once, delay it twice and Bingo! In goes the punchline.

How about these, specially created for this article:

1. "Ellen always takes 3 hours and 3 seconds to get ready: one hour to put on her make up, two hours to choose an outfit and 3 seconds to make up an excuse for being late."

2. "Katy was driving me to work recently. We had a row and she accused me of being childish. So I got out of the car, slammed the door and caught a choo-choo instead."

3. "Teachers have been given permission to deal with classroom thugs - now they can give them a clip around one ear, a clip around the other and shove 500 volts between them."

Going from the sublime to the ridiculous is another good way of getting laughs. This is true of humour generally, but particularly with Rule of Three.

Here's an example:

Now, as many of you know, Harry runs a successful business in property maintenance, although he has always been very modest about this. This caused a slight problem recently when he designed some new business cards.
He started with "Harry Stone - Managing Director," but he thought that was too boastful.

Then he went for "Harry Stone - executive in charge of commercial property, including air conditioning and sanitation." Trouble was that was too long.
So in the end he opted for "Harry Stone, bogs and boilers a speciality!"

Well that's about all for this month. I wish you all the best with your preparations.

With your Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets you will Double Guarantee your sucess in satisfying both your audience and yourself on the Big Day.

Good luck!

Bruno Barton :)

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com

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Creating Original Humour Lesson Two- Puns

Creating Original Humour for your wedding speeches Lesson Two

This month I'm going to start my series of blogs on joke making. On our web site you will be able to download a speech package to suit you; with the methods that I will teach you, you will be able to personalise your wedding speech with original wit appropriate to the Bride and Groom.

This month I take a look at creating puns, i.e. jokes based on double meanings. A vast percentage of all jokes fall into this category. The first step in writing a joke using a pun is to think of a word with more than one meaning.

For your wedding speech I recommend going several steps beyond that:-

Write down all the subjects and themes you can think of about
the Bride and Groom their shared interests their separate interests their history together etc. and brainstorm every single word and phrase that comes to
mind, whether it has an obvious double meaning or not, write
these down.

Then study these words for possbile puns.. Craft these into appropriate sentences I'm going to illustrate this using the subject of golf.

Here's my brainstormed list:

tee
drive
driver
driving
club
clubhouse
ball(s)
caddy
trolley
green(s)
fairway
bunker
flag
round
hole
iron
birdie
handicap
grip
stance
shank
hole in one

You may be able to think of many more, in which case why not have a go now! write down your extra words and follow along with the example.

As I say, I recommend that you go through this process for every aspect of the Bride and Groom that you can think of - by doing this you will come up with several strong ideas for jokes, and you don't need many.

The next step is to go through the list and write down as many meanings for each word, or phrases, that you can think of that use the word.

Here we go:

tee: golf ball holder, cup of tea, letter T, tee hee
drive: driver: golf club, car-driving, Minnie Driver, "drive a" long way
club: golf club to hit balls with, chocalate biscuit, social club,
golf club: club foot, card suit
clubhouse: 18th hole, clubs live there?
ball(s): golf ball, part of man's wedding tackle, dance, ball of foot,
lotto balls: a load of balls, bawl
caddy: club carrier, tea caddy
trolley: golf trolley, supermarket trolley, off-his-trolley
green(s): golf green, vegetables, ball colour in snooker, traffic light-go
fairway: golf fairway, fare way, fair weigh
bunker: golf bunker, air raid bunker, debunker, history is bunk
flag: golf flag, corner flag, flagpole, flagging (tired)
round: round of golf, come round (visit), come round (from
unconsciousness), circular, spherical,, round of pints, fat
hole: golf hole, dive, a right hole, whole, hole in wallet, polo mint
iron: ironing, cutlery, ion, steel
birdie: dicky bird, watch the birdie
handicap: golf handicap, disability, disadvantage, Andy Capp, handy cap
grip: grip on a golf club, grip on something else, get a grip
stance: stance when taking a shot, position on a subject
hole in one: one shot into the hole from teeing off, a physical hole in
something
shank: to knock the ball way off course, Armitage Shanks

And now we come to the analysis: scan down the list of twenty words and their meanings to see if a joke comes to mind.

What you are looking for is to deceive the wedding speech audience into thinking of one meaning when you actually mean the other.

My ideas follow in joke form - some are weak, but there are a few which are quite passable.

If you have ever done brainstorming at work you will know that at this stage it
is the quantity of ideas that matter! simply write them down,
do not stop to think or evaluate then - this comes later.

If you do this exercise for every area of the Bride and Groom's interests, you will probably be in a position of deciding which jokes not to use, and selecting only a few very good ones.

Clubs: I am sorry that James has decided to throw away his clubs, but
I'm delighted that in Jane he has picked up his hearts.

Driving: James was explaining to Jane at a time when she was learning
about golf, that a tee was something to hold his balls when he
was driving. She said "Gosh, BMW think of everything!"

Tee: he keeps his ball holders in a mug - it's his cup of tee.

Balls: On the fairway one day, Jane said: "James, what's that lump in your pocket?" He said "Don't worry, it's only golf balls." She said: "Is that something like tennis elbow?"

Green: James was thrown out of his first golf club for digging up the
turf and putting it in a flower pot. "What are you doing?" they said. He responded "I'm only potting the green." They said: "You fool! This is golf, not snooker!"

Hole: The eighteenth hole - you should have seen it, it was a right hole

Iron and Trolley: He knows a lot about golf equipment - you should see his 5
iron - it's a Russell Hobbs. And he's ever the radical - he was arrested when he wheeled out his new golf trolley - it was from Sainsbury's.

Handicap: I'm not sure if his handy-cap is his flat cap or his club foot.

Grip: At least all that work on his grip means he can now carry four beer mugs in each hand.

Hole in one: He took his new golf shoes back to the shop. Why? Because he
got a hole in one.

Shank: In the gents in the clubhouse last week, I saw that someone had written above the words Armitage Shanks: "aye, but nowhere
near as bad as James does!"

So I've managed to come up with some form of wit for 11 of the above 20 - odd terms. You can do the same with any subject.

You might even be able to think of more golf jokes from the above double meanings, or maybe even better ones than mine.

By the time you have done this exercise for several of the topics you identified you are sure to have a few humorous quips that closely adapt your speech to the people involved.

I wish you well with it.

I know that if you have got the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets you will have very good speeches at your disposal already; it can only enrich it further if you add some gems of your own using the methods outlined here, and over the next few months.

Bruno Barton :)


Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com

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Creating Original Humour, Lesson One :)

Wedding Speeches are usually humorous (not joke-a-minute!), so how do you create humour specific to the couple and their families?


The next six or so of my blogs will deal with the creation of original humour. It is intended that you will be able to use the tips shared to further enhance your wedding speech with original self-created and personalised humour.

Not every wedding speech is filled with puns and one-liners; many speeches succeed by virtue of their sincerity alone.

However, everyone at a wedding appreciates a little appropriate light relief, which is why you will find many jokes (as well as sincerity) in your Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets. Each of these speeches will work as-is (except for name changes), but there is nothing at all to be lost in having a go at creating your own original humour to personalise your speech a little.

My schedule for forthcoming articles is as follows:

Double meanings (puns), the rule of three, the creation and use of witty anagrams, plus how to use history to enhance your speech, using rhyme and acronyms, using lateral thinking to search for joke ideas and using mind mapping to generate humour.

I'd like to enlarge just a little on these subjects to whet your appetite prior to a fuller treatment later.

a) Double meanings- i.e. a play on words. Here is one example:
He's a light eater - as soon as it gets light, he starts eating.
As you can see, this joke uses two alternative meanings of the word light.

b) The Rule of Three- A series of three statements or revelations; the first and second might not be funny, but the third is, and being in a series of 3 magnifies and intensifies the humour value.

"I said to James once that you couldn't know whether someone was truly your lifetime sweetheart until you had broken wind in front of them, to gauge their reaction. James went ahead and tried it. Jane didn't mind, but her parents were disgusted. And the vicar was appalled… and so was everyone else at the funeral."

OK, perhaps it's not suitable for a wedding speech, but you get the idea :)

c) Anagrams and History- I will show you a source of anagrams on the internet and give you ideas how to use them.

d) Rhyme and Acronyms- I will show you how these can be used to great effect, particularly when directly relevant to the Bride and Groom.

e) Lateral Thinking- A very powerful tool which unlocks the creative potential of the mind, and how to use it to create humorous material.

f) Mind Mapping- Another mind-blowing thinking tool and how it can be used in conjunction with all the above to open up your mind and produce joke ideas.

And that's all for this month

Bruno Barton

:)

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com

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Why Plan My Speech ?

Why Plan Your Speech?
Copyright finespeeches.com 2008


"In this article I am going to offer a little advice from my years as a professional writer and speaker. But giving advice is often regarded as a bit overbearing."


Oscar Wilde, a proficient and experienced advice giver, said: "I never give a woman advice. In fact one should never give her anything she can't wear in the evening." And now a howler from a child's exam paper: "Socrates was a great Greek teacher. He went around giving people advice. They killed him."

Despite the possible perils of following in Socrates' footsteps, I still feel inclined to throw in my ha'pennyworth.

Why Plan? Some people do ask themselves the question: "Why should I plan my wedding speech?"

But some people don't even consider planning until it's too late. Which group would you rather be in?

You may have heard the saying, "Failing to plan is like planning to fail". A truer word has never been said.

As discussed in my article, "Prepare or Bust", you might feel able to "wing it", or you might feel that planning a speech is easy and quick. I get a staggering number of calls, a week and less before the wedding, from panic stricken speakers who have suddenly realised that they have no idea what to say or how to say it.

Planning a speech is not generally something quick and easy unless you are an expert or have access to one.

When deciding if you are going to plan in advance, consider the following issues:-
People do remember the speeches !!

Even if they don't remember the words used, they will remember if the wedding speeches were good or bad. One very potent reason for planning is that the majority of weddings these days are videoed, and who wants their failures to be immortalised on film?

I am reminded of the Irish wedding where the father of the bride's wallet was stolen at the reception. The mystery was solved when the video was processed: the best man was seen nicking it. Obviously things like this won't happen to any honest and conscientious best man, but there is a lesson there to be learned: your performance may be around to haunt you or to support your self esteem for years to come.

At FineSpeeches.com, we can help you to achieve the latter. Get the right sort of help. You wouldn't take on a plumber to fix your TV, or a mechanic to fit a carpet. So if you need help and advice on making a public speech, it must make sense to turn to a professional public speaker. I have nearly two decades of hands-on and eye-to-eye experience with all sorts of audiences including after dinner speaking and stand up comedy, plus seasoned experience of coaching people to speak effectively.

Planning the wedding speeches should be part of planning the wedding. The average cost of a wedding in the UK is more than £10,000. People plan and budget for every aspect of the wedding: the church, the organ, the reception venue, the food, champagne and flowers. Every aspect, that is, apart from the wedding speeches.

Often completely inexperienced men (and women) are thrown in front of an audience who are hoping against hope to be interested and entertained. Very often though they are bored, unable to hear or, worst of all, acutely embarrassed, perhaps by the speaker's material or perhaps by a speaker humiliating himself by lack of preparation.

Avoid common pitfalls !!

It is a fact that there are a number of pitfalls lying in wait for the wedding speaker, like snakes in the grass, each with their own collection of snakebites.

Mostly they arise from the rattlesnake of lack of knowledge:
Snakebite 1: What must I include?
Snakebite 2: How do I say it?
Snakebite 3: When do I say it?
Snakebite 4: How long should I speak for?
Snakebite 5: What else do I have to do?
Snakebite 6: How formal / informal should I be?

Please visit us at www.FineSpeeches.com for the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets containing ALL the effective antidotes to these and other snakebites, including those inflicted by the spitting cobra of stage fright.

Of course one of the most deadly snakes is the wriggling, slithering anaconda of speech content.

Among its snakebites are:
Snakebite 7: Is it interesting?
Snakebite 8: Is it snappy?
Snakebite 9: Is it light, without being too frivolous?
Snakebite 10: Is it clean?
Snakebite 11: Is it appropriate?

To avoid a severe case of venom, why not double protect and double guarantee yourself with our Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets or if you just want some free help and guidelines, visit us anyway :) http://www.FineWeddingSpeeches.com/

It is a good idea for you to have a concerted dredge through your experiences of the happy couple, their friends and families, for appropriate material and to edit these in to your other material. But if time is really not available, all is not lost.

The Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets will provide five professionally crafted speeches for you, any of which can be used as-is (except for insertion of the appropriate names). Along with our ALL of my step by steps guides to planning, preparing and delivery your speech with excellence !

Whichever route you take to prepare and practise for your wedding speech experience, I wish you huge success and enjoyment on the day.

Bruno Barton :)


Copyright 2008 Finepeeches.com
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Prepare Or Bust ? Your Choice

Wedding Speeches - Prepare or Bust!

Copyright finespeeches.com 2008

There are many different kinds of wedding speaker, including....

-The Rolls Royce, who is well oiled, almost inaudible and goes on for a long, long time....
-The pogo stick, who jumps along in fits and starts and sometimes collapses in a nervously gibbering heap !!

-The fellow who thinks he can "wing it ", and the guy who prepares for six months beforehand.

Whatever your background and your previous experience at public speaking, we at Fine Wedding Speeches can help you to excel on the day.

"It's my Wedding Speech - I'll "wing" it if I want to!"

I'm going to start off by talking about "winging it". Some people are naturally funny, particularly down the pub after a few beers. They think that giving a wedding speech is not far removed from wisecracking in their local bar: "I'll just sink a few beers and see what comes out."

Consider this: when you wing it, will you soar majestically over the mountains like a golden eagle … or will you tear around headless chicken-like in ever decreasing circles before imploding spectacularly in your beer? …

Or will you simply be a limp and totally flightless turkey?

I have known many people attempt the "winging" method. How many have I known succeed? Zero, zilch, zip all. This is an approach which always fails, unless you really are an experienced stand-up comedian - and even they "die" on stage sometimes.

You've probably seen this scenario yourself more than once: the speaker stands, looks up and in the cold light of day sees hundreds of pairs of eyes looking at him; his usual impromptu wit wings out of his head; he forgets the groom's name, his daughter's name; he starts to stammer; his knees knock and the contents of his bowels indicate their imminent desire to descend ankle-wards.

Completely humiliated, the speaker sits down, bows his head in shame and makes as sharp an exit as he can to drown his sorrows, his reputation as a wit shattered forever. But the worst thing for the speaker is that, more likely than not, his inglorious moment will probably be immortalised on videotape, remembered forever as The Wedding When Wisecracker Winged it.

Wedding Speeches Need Preparation !!

To deliver a speech of any sort requires some degree of preparation.

Mark Twain, an extremely gifted speaker, said, "It normally takes three weeks for me to prepare a short impromptu speech."

Most wedding speakers will not have the advantage of being extremely gifted, nor of being extremely experienced public speakers. Nevertheless nearly everyone can make a competent job of their wedding speech if they have the right help and follow an effective method of preparation.

Consider politicians, people who need to appear competent when addressing the public. Do they stand up and launch into something off the top of their heads? No, they have prepared an idea of the broad issues they want to talk about, the subjects they will cover, and the words they will use.

These professional public speakers frequently have an auto-cue, a lectern or other form of paper stand. They are not "speaking", they are "reading aloud". Admittedly they are doing it with animation and energy to involve and impress the audience. In many cases they have not written the speech itself, but have used a "Ghost Writer".

These practices are considered "tools of the trade" and successful public speakers of all kinds expect to use them. You can too!

The speaker who prepares his wise, witty and sincere words well in advance is the speaker who will "wow" them on the day; not only because his words will be well-chosen, but because he will have had time to practice his speech as many times as he feels necessary - in front of his wife, his mum, and maybe even bits of it in front of his mates down the pub.

Wedding Speeches Need Practice Remember the 5 P's: Perfect Practice Prevents Poor Performance.

By practicing in front of a sympathetic and constructively critical audience, you will be able to select, discard and hone jokes and anecdotes and sincerity so that you will become very confident of your material on the day.

Fear Factor? - Oh yes, been there, done that - coped anyway. Time and again, surveys have shown that people are generally more scared of public speaking than dying. You may be one of the many millions of people who are terrified at the prospect of being in front of an audience.

Believe me, I can empathise with you - up to 1987 I was one of the sweating, knee-knocking hordes myself, preparing to be Best Man for my brother Nick. Up to that point in my life I hadn't been able to bring myself to say anything when there was more than one person present, even down to cracking a joke down the pub.

If, like many people, you feel a great personal fear about your commitment to giving this wedding speech, visit your public library (or Amazon?) and read Susan Jeffers' amazing little book, "Feel the Fear And Do It Anyway". In 200 pages she will show you ways to turn your fears into confident action.

So if fear is your biggest obstacle to giving a successful wedding speech, learn how to use it as a tool to spur you to success.

What transformed me? I joined a public speaking club - International Training in Communication (ITC).

At my first meeting I was asked - non obligatorily - if I would like to stand up and improvise for two minutes on the subject of pets. Like a condemned man I slowly walked to the lectern. As a family we had hamsters, budgies, goldfish, tortoises, cats and dogs. Could I remember their names, their foibles, their lives, their deaths? No. Terrified, the sweat dripped down my face like Chinese water torture. It was, for me, like going over a trench at the battle of the Somme. But, however haltingly, I did it. And I returned the next week, and the next.

Six months later at Nick's wedding, people weren't just congratulating me on my speech, they were asking where they could book me! And now, people do book me - I'm a speech coach, an after-dinner speaker, a storyteller, and I've even had success as a stand up comedian.

How much better would it be for you if your Somme experience occurred months before the wedding rather than at the wedding itself? Why not contact a speakers club?

Three websites follow:
The Association of Speaker's Clubs:

www.the-asc.org.uk
Toastmasters International: www.toastmasters.org
ITC: www.itcgb.org.uk and www.itcintl.com

If you feel that such full and in-depth preparation is not for you, or if you don't feel inclined to train yourself up to near-professional standard for just one event, don't despair. At Fine Wedding Speeches you will find plenty of guidance, tips and advice which, if followed diligently, will ensure success on the day.

Now, having found out how to make your wedding speech, if you want the ultimate in proven, step by step, surefire sucess with your wedding speech then the Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets is for you !!

Get It Now At !! www.FineWeddingSpeeches.com

Wishing you fun preparing your speech and massive success on the day,

Bruno Barton..:)

Copyright 2008 FineSpeeches.com
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Free Help, Wedding Speech Etiquette

What did they think of my Wedding Speech?

They said: "As they can't hold me up as a Shining Example .... they'd just have to show me up as an Awful Warning! ..... They were joking of course. ..... I think."

We have probably all been to a Wedding where a speaker didn't gauge how different the families were and said something that either upset or offended one side.

To help you avoid this embarrassing situation plus looks that could kill from the bride's father, we have provided some useful hints about "traditional etiquette" below.

The first and most important principle to follow is that your wedding speech should be suited to the families and guests involved.

For example, if a very casual reception is intended, do make this clear to the guests and speakers, otherwise they will be confused and uncertain of what is expected from them. Nowadays it is common to depart from the strict formality of the past, so guests can no longer rely on the 'traditions' to guide them.

In today's world the reasoning behind some of the traditions is no longer relevant, or their purpose is no longer appropriate. Many weddings, if not most, now involve brides who are older than 20; furthermore the new wife is often NOT financially dependent on the new husband.

If you are interested in the origins of older traditions, we recommend Wedding Customs & Folklore by Margaret Baker, which is amusing and easy to read. It includes superstitions, love tokens, bride stealing and lots more.

If you think that the modern world is very 'liberal' and free about sex, just read what our ancestors got up to.

The world has changed, but there are certain customs that are still expected and nice to observe in celebration of the love and aspirations of the happy couple.

Some guidelines to consider:

The Toastmaster A more formal wedding may have a toastmaster.

The toastmaster opens the proceedings and keeps them flowing smoothly.

In the absence of a toastmaster the Best Man usually undertakes some of the tasks.

The Toastmaster's role includes:

Arranging the receiving line, and Introducing guests by name to the hosts.

Asking guests to take their seats, after the receiving line has welcomed everyone.

Announcing the arrival of the Bride and Groom, and escorting them to their places.

Introducing prayers before eating. If no clergyman is present, and no senior member of the families wants to, then the toastmaster often leads grace. Announcing the cutting of the cake, and inviting guests forward to take photographs.

Introducing the speakers, who will be proposing the traditional toasts, i.e. To the Bride & Groom - normally by the Father of the Bride, or an old friend of the family. To the health of the Bridesmaids - normally by the Groom. To the health of the parents, of the Bride and Groom - normally by the Best Man.

The Purpose of the Reception The traditional purpose of the reception is to welcome the guests who have often travelled a long way to be with you. It is also an opportunity to introduce members of the two families to each other.

Unless the families of the Bride and Groom actually live locally to each other, it is most probable that they do not recognise each other, so some introduction is helpful.

The formal part of this welcome is achieved by arranging a 'receiving line'. Wherever possible, the Bride and Groom together with their parents should arrive at the reception venue before the other guests so that they are available to meet them as they arrive.

The Receiving Line: The toastmaster or best man will arrange the receiving line. The best place is in an assembly area or the entrance to the dining hall. The toastmaster should introduce each guest, by name, to their hosts.

The traditional order in the line is:
The Bride's mother The Bride's father The Groom's mother The Groom's father, then a small gap The Bride The Groom This introduction is not the time for a chat but for a quick courtesy comment.

A compliment, thanks for the invitation, congratulations on the event, comment on the lovely service, etc. At some venues the design of the building or the number of the guests means that there is simply not enough space to hold a full six-person receiving line. In this case tradition allows for the Bride's mother to act as host, while the Bride and Groom circulate among the guests to welcome them.

The Celebration Meal: Once all the guests have been formally 'received' the toastmaster will ask them to take their seats for the meal. There is usually a seating plan and name signs at each table place.

Once the guests are seated, the toastmaster announces the arrival of the Bride and Groom and escorts them to their places on the top table. The guests stand and applaud during this. Normally seated at the top table are the Bride and Groom, their parents, the Best Man and the bridesmaids.

If grace is to be said, then while everyone is still standing is a good time. (Tip: The Bride and Groom should stay on their feet, as seeing them sit is a visual cue for the guests to sit also). If a clergyman is present, usually the one who performed the ceremony, then they will usually be asked to say grace. Otherwise a senior member of either family or the toastmaster may lead grace.

Cutting the Cake: Once the dessert has been completed the toastmaster will announce the cutting of the cake, and invite guests forward to take photos, if practical. The real division of the cake is usually performed by the catering staff and served to the guests with coffee.

Champagne: After the coffee, champagne or other drink is served.

The Toasts: At this point the toastmaster begins by introducing the speakers who will propose the following 'traditional' toasts:

The Bride and Groom - normally by the Father of the Bride, or an old friend of the family.

To the health of the Bridesmaids - normally by the Groom. (Presents now? )

- If the groom is giving gifts, now is a good opportunity. (Bride's speech now? )

- If non-traditionally the bride wants to say a few words, now is a good opportunity.

To the health of the parents, of the Bride and Groom - normally by the Best Man.

At the end of the formal speeches the toastmaster may ask the guests to applaud the Bride and Groom, or the entire top table, while they leave the reception room.

At modern weddings the bride may feel that she wants to say a few words, there is no special order for this and it can be fitted into the order at any point by agreement, make sure that the Toastmaster knows!

Presents: The Bride and Groom usually give presents to say thank you to:-
the Best Man the Bridesmaids their Parents

Who says what? There are traditions concerning the content of the principal speeches, as follows:

The Father of the Bride; Welcome all the guests to the wedding, on behalf of your wife and yourself. Thank them for coming to help you celebrate the wedding of your daughter. Tell them about your daughter - skills, abilities, achievements, character, reminiscences. It is common for there to be gentle teasing.

Tell them about your new son in law - skills, abilities, achievements, character, reminiscences. Perhaps more gentle teasing? Toast the Bride and Groom. "So, ladies and gentlemen, family and friends, let us raise our glasses and join together in wishing them every happiness. I give you the toast of the Bride and Groom, ... And ... May God bless them."

The Bridegroom; Thank the Bride's father for proposing the toast. Thank him for the wedding feast (if appropriate). Thank him for his kindness and friendship. Thank him for his daughter. Thank the guests for their good wishes, and for coming. Thank everyone for their gifts. Thank your 'new' wife for marrying you! Thank the Bridesmaids who have helped your wife through the day. Comment on their charm & beauty. - not too much, though, as you may make your new wife jealous! As well as the traditional thank-yous the Groom may wish to add a few words about how he met his wife, activities they share, etc. Gentle teasing is allowable. Toast the Bridesmaids: "Ladies and gentlemen, will you join me in drinking the toast of 'The Bridesmaids' - thank you."

The Best Man;The Best Man speaks on behalf of the Bridesmaids (and other helpers - ushers, etc.), and thanks the Groom for his toast. He also: Toasts the Parents: "I should like to add to the thanks to the parents which (Bridegroom) has already expressed on this wonderful occasion. I ask you to join me in drinking the toast of 'The Parents'". In addition to these two 'official' components, the Best Man's speech usually includes various anecdotes about the Bride and Groom. Again it is common for there to be gentle teasing. Telegrams, cards and emails may be read out from people who were not able to attend.

The Bride; There are no 'traditional' components to a Bride's speech. I refer back to my comments on how the economic and social realities have changed over the years.

Final Comments As you can see, many of the traditional components of the wedding celebration assume that: It is a religious ceremony. The Bride's father is paying for the reception. The Bride will be financially dependent on the Groom. Nowadays these assumptions are often invalid and you need to adapt to the individual circumstances.

Therefore many of the above notes on traditional forms may need to be altered or ignored.

However, the structure of the traditions seems a good starting point for wedding celebrations:

Welcome guests Celebration meal Speeches of congratulations and thanks Traditions give people guidance on what is expected of them. If you want to be different, let the guests know so they do not feel uncertain and uncomfortable.

Remember: It's a PARTY!

Bruno Barton :)

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Free Help, Planning Your Speech

Free Help: Planning and Preparing Your Wedding Speech


Wedding speeches are an opportunity! - Make your mark!

"It usually takes me more than three weeks
to prepare for a good impromptu speech."
- Mark Twain

Clearly you want to wow your audience and have them laughing in the right places for the right reasons. To achieve this it is vital that you prepare carefully.
Professional public speakers are like experienced drivers: the skills needed have become automatic to them.

They are successful because they use the three P's of public speaking:
Preparation Practice Performance Even vastly experienced public speakers who appear to be speaking off the cuff generally prepare in advance:

Preparation Introduction

There is a lot to say about the preparation stage. It is the part that requires the most work and which the audience never sees. It is like the foundations of a building.

A building will crumble, or at least subside if the foundations and lower levels are not soundly built. It will look decidedly odd.

Without thorough preparation and good material it is hard to deliver a good speech even if you practice until you are blue in the face. This is why at this site we give you guidance on how to practice and perform your speech, and offer you the "The Master Class Wedding Speech Secrets" and a choice of extra material for your preparation.

Decide how to prepare your material Either make up your own, or use one of our ready-to-use speeches "as is" with only names changed. This is a simple and quick option.

You will have a quality speech, available rapidly; particularly useful if you have been approached for a speech with little notice. Or adapt a ready-to-use speech (this gives the chance to make it specific and relevant to the wedding couple and guests): Mix and match from several example speeches. Add and subtract jokes or quotations, Pay attention to the 'flow' and 'feel' of the speech.

Length of speech; Too short may seem rude, too long may be boring. Five minutes is a good rule of thumb (and will probably feel like a long time).
If you have an exceptional speech and prepare to deliver it really well, you might choose to stretch to 10 minutes.

However, bear in mind that if the other speakers did the same then the guests would be listening for 30 - 40 minutes, and if some of them are children you may encounter some unexpected 'heckling' as the children get bored - even if the parents are laughing.

A great subject You only need one excellent idea to make the speech successful and memorable.

To be of this calibre an idea needs to:
Be well suited to the humour tastes of the majority of the audience Be in some way relevant to the generally known history of the wedding couple or their families Grab the attention of the guests and involve them so they 'anticipate' the story outcome or punch line. (They don't have to guess right for this to work, they just have to be guessing).

The point is, if you find such a good idea, make the most of it. Don't feel a need to swamp it with other stories or jokes. You may find it possible to refer to the basic idea at several points in the speech. Audiences love this.

Don't worry if you don't find such an idea. Instead use a combination of ideas, stories, jokes and quotations and meld them together to achieve a similar end.


Gather Information Unless you intend to stick strictly to a pre written speech you will probably want to gather some information about the families and their histories.

Possible useful subjects might include:

The weddings and marriage of the parents - how times have changed?
Are the families both local, or have they come from different regions or countries? Marriage customs may differ between the families?
Where did the bride / groom grow up?
How did the bride / groom meet?
Have they had any unusual / special experiences?
Did they meet the Queen / President / someone famous?
Did/Do they travel extensively?
Have they received any awards or medals? Sporting achievements? Academic achievements?
Do they have any famous ancestors?
Do they have any interesting hobbies?

The anecdote does not have to be fantastically funny, because it benefits from being relevant to the families.


If in doubt, leave it out!

Avoid anything in dubious taste!

The point of the wedding speech is to entertain rather than to shock or offend. Avoid stereotypes. Avoid negatives, regrets or criticisms. Anything that may make the couple or the families appear foolish automatically makes you look foolish for raising the subject - even if you thought it was funny, some guests won't. Trust me on this. Avoid rude jokes or sexual innuendos unless you are VERY sure of all the guests and their sense of what is funny. Even then some guests may have children present and the parents may disapprove even if they found the joke funny. Get someone to check your speech for unintentional double meanings and puns.

Work out your structure Prune your notes and arrange them in order.
Make sure that you have included all the essentials - the thank-yous and the toast!

Get your material checked out. Did you know Uncle Silvester, for example, was an accountant? So avoid accountant jokes, or perhaps go the other way and make lots of them.

This may be particularly effective (or disastrous) if there are several accountants among the guests, or if the bride / groom is an accountant.

The point is ... find out days before giving the speech, this is particularly important for the best man who may not know the families well.

Avoid unwitting references to family skeletons - check with the "in-laws" as the bride / groom may not know of the previous generation's skeletons.
A good friend will tell you if it is really as funny as you think. A bad friend will tell you it's funny when it's not!

Speaker's Notes Benefits of different sizes of speaker's notes: An A5 card will be less distracting than a big sheet of A4 paper flapping about. You may prefer to use the smaller postcard sized "box-file" cards which can be mostly hidden in the palm of your hand, but you will need more of them, and it is harder to keep your place as you give the speech. We recommend that you get hold of some white A4 card from a stationer's. Cut the cards across the middle to create a set of A5 cards.


During the design and initial stages of practicing you may alter the wording and content several times. It may be useful to use your computer to alter the speech and put in 'headings' etc. using A4 paper. Then when the speech content is really settled, transfer the words in large letters to the A5 cards.

Note: Tips Don't try to cram the speech onto as few cards as possible! You'll never be able to read it. Feel free to abbreviate if it means you get a convenient section on one card. Number the cards in case you drop them.

Alternatively, punch holes in them and connect them with a tag or key ring. Highlight, emphasise and underline key words and phrases. Do this while you are practicing.

Once you are satisfied with your delivery during practice, you may find it useful to put 'headings' in suitable places. Make these large and bold. It is then easier to find your place if you do need to refer to the cards, and easier to spot the next subject.

"On-site" preparations

Check your transport arrangements - do you know the way there? and will you have a parking space booked? Have you allowed for the possibility of the train being late (ask yourself "what if" questions). Check out the venue beforehand if possible - where will you sit, where will you speak from, etc. Check any equipment - microphone? Lectern? Autocue!!? Check you have a glass of water to hand (and where is the toilet?!!).


Practicing Make sure that you can tell the jokes! If you find something funny it can sometimes be difficult to tell it to other people without ending up in a fit of giggles. This is amusing for the guests but does rather spoil the punchline. You may have an excellent joke or story but are forever stumbling over the punchline. To get over these problem:- Rehearse the joke out loud until it no longer makes you laugh. Rehearse it in front of a mirror, until you can get all the words out smoothly. Remember you might find a joke funny which others do not. If in doubt, check with friends.


Rhythm Practice as many times as necessary to get the phrasing, the pauses, the timing exactly right.

One speaker recommends you should practise an hour in total for every minute in the speech. So for a four minute speech, four hours practicing. This is not excessive.

Speak the speech - don't read it in a dull monotone. Speak it as if you are talking in conversation. Modulate your voice up and down. The larger the audience, the greater the modulation needed.

Visualisation How to "visualise" How many people will you be speaking to at the reception? Bear this in mind and visualise them - imagine yourself projecting your voice and 'presence' to the back. If you visualise them you will be less likely to get stage fright on the Big Day, when looking at a sea of expectant faces. Imagine yourself speaking clearly, don't rush it. In your mind's eye see the audience - make eye contact with them and move your gaze around the room as you should try to on the day itself for optimum effect. Visualisation is a great tool for any learned skill, including public speaking.


Eye contact Try not to have your eyes glued to your card. Read a phrase, look up and make eye contact, deliver it, look down for the next phrase. If you make a point of establishing eye contact with a different section of the audience each time, by the end of the speech you will have looked at and included everyone.
Practise your imaginary eye contact.


Snags? Visualise how you will effortlessly recover from any little problems that might occur on the day:

You spill your glass of water - possible recovery => step back from the spill, cover it with your napkin, apologise to the person sitting next to you and ask for their help, turn back to guests and continue ... e.g. "well I knew I had to do something dramatic to get started".

The microphone is broken => you project your voice magnificently.
You lose your voice the day before => now this is a difficult one! Have you got your speech completely written out (or typed) with headings and highlights? - then perhaps someone else can stand in for you, preferably after some hoarsely whispered guidance on the rhythm and timing which you had planned.

What would I say/do if ? ....... (what else could go wrong?) If you consider all the options, nothing will faze you on the day.

Practicing - and the reduction of stage fright There are techniques you can use if you feel assaulted by stage fright on the day (see "Performance"). You can also plan for the possibility of stage fright, and take action in advance to prevent or reduce it. It need not overwhelm.

Remember that most public performers will say that some level of nerves is necessary as it demonstrates that you really care about the quality of your performance and its effect on your audience.

Start by re-defining stage fright as being 'keyed-up and alert, ready to give of your best'. This is not quite so 'punchy', not such a good 'sound bite', but it is a more helpful way of looking at things. Make 'stage-fright' work for you! That way it doesn't seem so frightening. Even after effective practice you can still expect to have butterflies, but you should find that once you start speaking on the day they will fly in formation.

If you can stand the fear, practice in front of a friend (this is an excellent dry run because it is often more frightening than the real thing). Choose someone who is an encourager by nature and ask them to give constructive advice on your delivery, projection etc.

If you do this it will help you enormously in getting over your inhibitions. Try recording yourself onto a tape. You will hear your weak points and your strong points. Do this a few times, work on the weaker areas and you will hear a steady improvement. Check your modulation, does it need greater emphasis? As you rehearse your speech - Visualise the event, visualise how the reception will go, visualise yourself speaking, and most importantly visualise the guests laughing at your jokes - and give them long enough to laugh after each joke before continuing.

If you are afraid of stage fright on the day, visualise now! Visualise suddenly getting tongue tied, and then pausing, gathering your thoughts looking at the guests, smiling at them and continuing onwards.

Remember:
Persistent Practice Prevents Poor Performance

Performing A few notes on alcohol Some speakers unfortunately try to get over their stage fright by drinking alcohol. Nothing is more embarrassing to an audience than a tiddly speaker. It is amazing how silly a drunk speaker sounds.
By all means have one drink, but if you really want to do a good job, save the majority of the drinking until afterwards - by then people will be buying them for you!

It's also a good idea to lay off tea and coffee. Caffeine will make your jitters worse. Stick to soda water, mineral water or fruit juice, but not too much because you do not want to be caught short during your speech. Did you remember the location of the toilet?

Stage fright first aid On the day you will probably experience a certain amount of stage fright ("keyed up readiness - remember?").

Don't be afraid of it - no actor / comedian / speaker ever delivered a successful performance without a measure of fear.

However, stage fright can have unfortunate side effects - sweating, shaking, heart beating furiously, etc.

There are steps you can take to minimise these effects before you speak, namely:

Find the time to take long deep breaths - breathe right in, deep into your belly; slowly breathe out. Do it repeatedly. It works !!

Breathe in for four counts. Hold your breath and tense your toes for four counts. Breathe out for four counts. You should feel tension easing. Repeat with feet, ankles, calves, knees etc., right up your body to your neck, chin, lips, eyelids, forehead and scalp. You should be able to sneak this in without anyone noticing while sitting at the table.

If you have the time, repeat these exercises as necessary. When all is said and done, even if you have practiced endlessly and got your delivery perfect, on the day you will probably feel nervous to some degree.

In your nervousness you might imagine that you're shaking like a leaf and everyone can see quite plainly that you're scared stiff.

Consider these points:-
The audience are on your side - most of them would be scared stiff themselves. They're with you, not against you. If you don't transcribe your speech onto cards and you do shake while holding a piece of A4 paper, the shakes will be amplified by your speech flapping around like a windsock.

See "Preparation". In practice almost every speaker is far more nervous than they look. You might feel nervous, but if you practice, prepare and deliver according to these guidelines, people will in all probability come up to you afterwards and say what a good job you've done. Get your audience to laugh with you - an excellent way to defuse your own tension and nerves.

Delivery BE CONFIDENT. You have prepared everything that could possibly be prepared for this moment. You have practiced a lot, your cards are in your hand, highlighted and underlined. You can have done no more. Be confident in that. The audience want you to do well and will not be critical.

Remember that and be confident in that as well. STAND UP. Wait for complete silence - don't be afraid of silences and pauses, they can be as eloquent as words. Don't hurtle into the speech to get it over with as quickly as possible. Establish eye contact with the audience. Look around at every section of the audience.

Remember your visualisation? Put it into practice now. Weigh your phrases, don't rush them. Really use your pauses. After a punchline, wait for them to jolly well laugh and don't start again until they have stopped laughing. Should they not laugh at a joke, it's not the end of the world. Some lines are intended mostly as links and aren't necessarily meant to be riotously funny. Move on to the next line and whatever you do don't accelerate through the speech just because they didn't laugh at one point where you thought they would.

Remain measured, using your pauses to allow the audience to digest your words, get to the end, propose whichever toast is yours to toast, and sit down to take your applause.

Concluding Thoughts A quick note for the Best Man: don't read all the greeting cards the Bride and Groom have received.

A lot of people dread the Best Man's speech because so many Best Men spend absolutely ages at the end of their speech endlessly droning through a stack of cards which all say much the same thing. By all means read two or three of them, perhaps ones specially chosen by the Bride and Groom.

You should by now be armed with everything you need - give it all you've got!
Good luck and best wishes for a successful day.

PS: Did I mention...
Persistent Practice Prevents Poor Performance

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