MOSTOV'S MUSINGS

Give the groom’s best friend a microphone and you never quite know what will happen next. After 28 years of weddings, I’ve heard Best Man speeches that brought entire rooms to tears, speeches that nearly brought marriages to an end, and plenty that landed somewhere wonderfully in between. The best ones embarrass the groom, make everyone laugh, celebrate the couple, and reveal exactly why this particular friendship matters.

That is the extraordinary thing about music. Photographs can show us what something looked like. Video can show us what happened. Stories can remind us of things we once knew. Music can do something stranger. Music can return the feeling. A handful of notes can collapse decades with absolutely no warning. Suddenly you don't merely remember being twenty-one; for a moment, you remember what twenty-one felt like.

There will almost certainly be someone, somewhere, who can still take the date. But “available” and “right for us” are not remotely the same thing. A couple who started with 30 viable choices may now have five. And if those five are more expensive, don’t fit their personalities, require accepting an assigned DJ, or don’t offer the particular services they wanted, availability alone isn’t much consolation.

Oktoberfest season is here, which means the bratwurst is sizzling, the beer steins are filling, and accordions everywhere are preparing for their annual moment in the sun. I’m not really a polka fan, yet the music has followed me my entire life—from carousels and Cleveland to beer halls and wedding dance floors, where a rare polka request can awaken guests I had long since written off as wallflowers. So how did a 19th-century dance from Bohemia become part of Northeast Ohio’s

Wedding DJ Bingo: 24 squares, one free space, and a guaranteed full house every Saturday night. August 27, 2026 I have spent a great deal of my career insisting that no two weddings are alike. I stand by that statement. Every couple brings a different personality into the room. Every family has its own dynamics. Every group of friends has its own history. Musical tastes, personalities, traditions, priorities, venues, timelines, comfort levels, drinking habits, dancing abiliti