DJ Persist was flat out amazing…read more We found out about him at my wife's Barrister's Ball when she was still attending Depaul Law a few years ago. He had the entire room dancing all night so we just we went up to him and got his card. It was still in my wallet 2 years later, so we called him and set everything up. We decided to get married at a restaurant called Carnivale and rocked it! His name is Jesse. He's very organized, VERY professional and VERY helpful. We told him what we wanted and he delivered with ease. He will offer tons of suggestions to make your wedding as special as possible and he didn't disappoint. In a sense, he kind of works as a day of coordinator to keep things on schedule. We LOVED him. His cost was $1000 which was pretty good for his service. He doesn't charge for working over a few extra hours and his basic package includes his state of the art sound system, 2 wireless microphones (which one did temporarily stop working during me reading my vows but he made up for that with his service), access to this really cool website that allows you to create a timeline for your event, add music that you want to play or don't want to play, and set music to play at certain points during the wedding. We were so confident in Jesse that we paid him in full up front but he only requires I believe at least 25% deposit and the rest before or at your event. We got nothing but positive feedback from our guests about him. One of our friends was shocked that he wore a tux because DJs typically don't do that. The music was the best hits of the 90s, early 2000s and whatever else we wanted to hear. There was even a woman there with a leg brace on that refused to sit down because the music and mixes were just so good! We'd definitely hire DJ Persist again and we are so glad we picked him. If you are contemplating, do it. You will not be disappointed!

This review is exactly 1 year late (7.13.2019), how embarrassing! DJ Persist (Jesse) and his team…read morewere beyond amazing helping us with cocktail hour music, MC'ing the whole reception and keeping us on task/on time, of course DJ'ing, and the photo booth on our wedding day! We were looking for a bilingual English/Spanish DJ that was a native speaker, which was important to us, and a DJ that was knowledgeable of English and Spanish music and blended them well. DJ Persist was our unicorn and we're so glad we found him!! He did a phenomenal job of doing all of the above, paying attention to detail, mindful of our requests/musical personalities, did an awesome job reading the room/energy and progression of the night, keeping us on task and so much more! DJ Persist is warm and had great energy! We felt so comfortable with him and were confident from day one that he was going to do an excellent job on our wedding- and he did! He surpassed all expectations and we couldn't be happier with how everything turned out. Throughout the planning process and day of he was great with communication, organization, artistry and creativity! We appreciate him working with our vendors and day of coordinator! DJ Persist, THANK YOU SO MUCH! You are awesome and, as you saw, once the dance floor opened up, I couldn't stop dancing! We cannot recommend you enough! Below you'll find a picture from the photo booth. The photo booth, the attendant, the quality of the equipment and ways to personalize it were great! THANKS AGAIN, Jesse!

Steve and I just had our engagement party with DJ Thomas Ulrich on May 11, 2024. We could not have…read moreasked for a better experience with him overall! He was recommended by a friend who had him for several of their family weddings and loved him! He was a true professional and was supportive in helping with suggestions when we weren't sure about what song to use for each item, etc. We danced all night and people were so impressed with the music and his professionalism. Our photographer cancelled last minute and he helped take pictures! We highly recommend Thomas! The DJ is one of the most important parts of a party, make sure you get a great one! Thanks Thomas! Yolanda and Steve

Rich and John thank you for all your hard work! You have a great company and I was VERY pleased…read morewith your service!! John was very pleasant, up-lighting and truss system were AMAZING; a total wedding must! They even stayed 30min pass 12 for my guests who still wanted to DANCE!! We packed the floor all night long! I feel that my feedback & comment sections for the company survey really encompasses what others should know about the service rendered and the company as a whole. I added a little here and there to make it more complete and voice some of my personal preferences and explanations for some dislikes. 1) Quality of Customer Service before your wedding? (initial meeting, phone and Internet communication) They were Excellent; they were very attentive to the details of my vision, they met with us at our chosen location, instead of making us drive to downers. Huge plus since we lived in the city and had 4 other wedding vendor appointments that day!! 2) Friendliness/Promptness/Appearance of your DJ? (DJ John) Excellent! My wedding was more formal and my DJ had a tux/suit and his assistant was presentable as well. John was very nice and always had a smile on his face, even when reminding me that we deviating from our timeline. ( we had a few hiccups in our day..) 3) Your DJs overall performance? (Professionalism, Music selection,Cooperation, etc.) Good :D. I would have said excellent, but John did not play some really important songs requested by me for my family/culture :( I strongly believe that this may have been a direct result because the music selection was not All English. However, we did let Rich and John know what genre/styles of music and special cultural dance music we wanted. It just came down to getting the music file itself. Further, we would have liked the DJ to follow up with us before the week of the wedding, when we were occupied everyday with wedding appointments. Had we met sooner we could have potentially avoided the music selection miscommunication ( did not play important songs or confused the meaning of a song e.g. La Vibora de la Mar, El Muerto and no Rancheras..etc.). When everything is top priority, often enough people don't react, remember, or re-prioritize tasks until its made known that you may run out of time.. We were so Stressed that we never felt like we had any time to do anything.. everything was a priority and had to be done right away. My husband and I tried to load the songs onto the website and sometimes we'd make it all the way to the bottom and it turned out that it didn't save! Needless to say ,since we were under a severe time crunch, due to the short engagement (6mo from "yes" to "I do"), we got to as much as we could done on the website and moved on... It would have been nicer had the site been more user-friendly or if the DJ's could get some of the work out of the way based on genre input we had initially given them and only left us to tweak up the details. For example. it would have been nice, if I did not feel like I had to pick every song I wanted played at my wedding. I know they meant well, by trying to assure that they played all of our favorite songs when we were in the room; I just felt that the level of detail they wanted from us was too much ( this is a general statement for some of the industry vendors). I know a lot of the things i just mentioned sound harsh, but since they deal with weddings, they should expect chaos and rushed schedules and should plan to follow up or aid more. Still was very happy with the service, and had I been able to clone myself 4Xs it would have not been a problem, but since that was not the case.. I could have used a little more sanity when planning the wedding and less demand from all the vendors to micromanage the job. 4) Sound and lighting equipment - sound quality, sound system appearance, lighting effects appearance. Excellent! They had great lighting effects. I would have liked a little more, but the effect was great anyways and everyone liked it! There was rain during the lighting setup so it was decided that no out outdoor lighting could be set up - I was really sad to have not been able to complete my vision because the rain stopped just before guests were to arrive and after the setup had left :'( ! 5) Overall performance rating of our services? I still say Excellent, because they were really nice and tried really HARD to make everything wonderful. My guests were very pleased and no one knew about these little details, except me and you now. 6) Is there anything we can improve upon? Communication with the future bride and groom, more flexible hours to plan the event ahead of time. Make every attempt to fully understand bride and groom's requests and deliver on them. Follow-up more frequently, unless requested not to and try to minimize the work a couple has to do to have good music and setup. 7) Would you recommend our service to others? I highly recommend Essence Entertainment :D !!

We hired the DJ Firm this year for our vow renewal and reception…read more We actually had the DJ Firm DJ for our small wedding last year, which shows how much we enjoyed them! We had DJ Sho (Jose) this year as our DJ - we also rented the photo booth and cold sparklers through the DJ Firm. DJ Sho did a fantastic job of keeping our guests on the dance floor and the party going! To no fault of Sho's, there was an audio hiccup but he was able to recover and pick the party back up. The cold sparklers were a hit - we added them on last minute ourselves -I highly recommend them to anyone even remotely considering them!! In terms of the process of selecting songs and lining things up, the site that the DJ Firm uses makes it really simple to do so. One thing to keep in mind when booking is that the style of most of these DJs is not to play full songs but to mix into and out of songs (fairly) quickly, so you will want to make sure that is your style before booking. It definitely kept our guests engaged and on the dance floor! The only thing I wish was that there was two photo booth attendants included as for a portion of our evening there was no attendant around, so guests were left to their own ways to ensure enough photos printed. However, DJ Firm helped ensure we were able to get copies of all of our photos! Tip: make sure to have something available for them to put the extra copy in ! We had missed that there wasn't something provided by default. I highly recommend the DJ Firm and their crew for all of your event needs!

Within 15 minutes of the reception starting, we had SO many people coming up to us telling us this…read morewas the best wedding DJ experience they've ever had. No one wanted the party to end, the dancefloor was packed the entire night which was our goal. We have the most fun group of friends/family and every single one of them had an absolute blast. The only reason one of our friends left the dance floor was because he ripped his pants from dancing so hard. People are still texting us about the DJ/music. We will recommend you to everyone we know so we can have even more amazing nights like Saturday. We can't thank the DJ firm enough for the energy and joy you brought our group. The saxophone was an absolute electric hit and everyone is still raving about that too. Out of this world performance from DG Sax & DJ Sye. Such an iconic duo of extremely talented gentlemen. They made the night one that every single person in that room will remember forever and ever. We just can't thank you enough

Update on John's unprofessional services: didn't hear from him or any DJ from his company until the…read moreday of our event. Since he told me to find another DJ I did just that so we were set with Jaz Entertainment (Carlos is awesome). A-List sent a DJ at 6:30pm along with John's sidekick to ask if we still wanted their services. They tried to get me to say I didn't need a DJ but that isn't accurate since I did need a DJ and that's what I contracted them for. John is still refusing to refund and I've filed a complaint with BBB. Fortunately someone else stepped up to save the event.

John at the beginning was very nice, but the more I worked with him, the more I found him to lie…read more He started being very pushy about wanting the rest of his balance and wanting me to "put a good word in for him" with other event planners. At one time, he needed the money because he'd just had a baby and the following year he had the same excuse...kind of weird. I did not appreciate his pushing and trying to make me feel sorry for him.

Before starting the wedding planning process, I never imagined myself spending a lot time with…read moreselecting a DJ for our wedding. We spent about 3 months interviewing DJ's, but none of them felt like, "the one". I also realized that the DJ plays an important role in the wedding reception and that we needed the perfect person that could create the right atmosphere for our guests. We met with DJ Jones in his comfortable River North office on a Sunday afternoon. We were with him for about an hour and a half and were totally blown away by him. He came across as someone that was experienced and knowledgeable in his field. Before the wedding, he always responded to my many emails quickly. On the day of the wedding, he did an outstanding job at keeping our guests out on the dance floor. The dance floor was never empty and many guests commented on how well he did.

Best wedding DJ ever! You need to hire Duerell if you are getting married and want an awesome dance…read moreparty. Duerell provided incredible service from start to finish and the music was the best of any wedding I have been to (in my very biased opinion). The dance floor was packed from start to finish and guests of all ages were dancing. Duerell did an amazing job catering to music for all ages-everyone keeps telling me how amazing the DJ at our wedding was. I can't recommend Duerell and Spark Entertainment Group more highly!

We hired DJ Mike for a recent event at my job simply for the fact that he brings all his own…read moreequipment for a good price. On top of those things, he's especially easy to work with. He's insured, and gave us everything we needed to hire him with a quick turnaround. He answered all of my questions quickly, via both email and phone. On the day of the event, he arrived early and was flexible with our other performers and was a great emcee. We would absolutely hire him again and I would recommend him for pretty much any event!

I used them for my third child's Bar Mitzvah. He was great. This is not just from a father's…read morepoint of view, but from the kids. He was able to have almost all of the kids dancing all of the time. I would hire him again for any future events we have. After having 3 major events with 3 different DJs, Michael was far better than the others. The big advantage is the Michael truly loves what he does, and it shows.

When me and my then fiance were looking for a Dj for our wedding we were at a loss due to the fact…read morethat EVERYONE charged an additional arm and a leg to add ceremony services to a package. Also, we had a very diverse guest count with different age groups that really didn't classify as a group lol We found John and it was by far the best deal we've gotten from anything wedding related. We felt like we owed him with all the services he includes with his packages! We met with John and Tony and it felt like an elephant left my chest after we left our first meeting. They answered all our questions, we seen videos of previous events and they gave suggestions for games to get the guests entertained before dinner. Days before the wedding i was so scattered brain, indecisive and changed my mind on so many songs and nothing was a problem they updated everything immediately and assured me that everything would be fine. I didn't feel like they were a vendor i felt like they were FAMILY. The patience, thorough communication, suggestions and support was more than expected. Anyway enough about them. The day of we had John, Tony and Rico and you better believe they had backup upon backup upon backup! They came early to set up and greet us. Once the reception started people were non stop dancing. Dancing, dancing, dancing dancing. Their light shows was a huge hit as well. They did such a great job people didn't want to leave when it was over because the music was so good!! Phenomenal! I'm still getting text msgs telling me about how good the playlist were. And honestly that was all John, Tony and Rico's doing. I can't thank them enough for truly making the day amazing!! Remember music is utmost important when it comes to a party and you will be ecstatic and astonished when you choose Dimensions in sound!!!

We had John do DJ and Karaoke for us for our block party. First, he was super easy to work with…read moreprior to the event. He was very responsive over email in setting up the contract. Then, we we saw rain in the forecast, he was very responsive over the phone in helping us with workarounds in case it rained. At the block party he played great music and was super accommodating with all of our karaoke choices. Their equipment all worked perfectly. The karaoke screen was easy to see, the speakers sounded great, the volume was spot-on, the microphones worked perfectly, and they even set up disco lights for us when it got dark out! Super fun. Everyone really enjoyed having him there and we would definitely hire him for next year! His prices are very reasonable as well. Finally, John is such a nice a gracious person. I really enjoyed talking with him while they were setting up and tearing down their equipment.

DJ XLNC was a big hit at our wedding! We had Indian and Sri Lankan families coming together and a…read morevariety of generations...DJ XLNC has amazing transitions so that everyone felt like their favorite song was playing the whole time. He also was so helpful to us, MC-ing the reception, helping us create mixes for our dances...just above and beyond. Many people at the wedding asked us for his contact info because they enjoyed him so much. Highly recommend!