Express & Star

Watch: Marryoke - our wedding video is a right 'kara' on

This bride and groom are 'getting down' with wedding guests as they take part in a new internet craze called marryoke.

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Felicity and Scott Mcloughlin decided to make a wedding video they would never forget.

With some special effects the couple, along with their guests, were on fire.

The idea came from a similar stunt at a friend's wedding two years ago.

Marryoke – which is a play on the word karaoke – is a trend within the wedding industry which involves participants miming and performing a song of their choice.

The footage is usually shot on the wedding day.

"We weren't engaged when we went to our friend's wedding," Felicity said.

"But we knew there and then we wanted to do something similar at our wedding.

"We got engaged last July, after been together just over 10 years, so we organised everything pretty quick."

A Leap of Faith for the boys in the wedding video

The couple were married at Haughton Hall, in Shifnal, and Felicity said: "The staff were great. They hadn't heard of a marryoke either, but really enjoyed it, and the grounds are quite big so we had loads of places to film.

"We decided to use the same video company our friends did in 2013, as we really liked their video, and we sent out the song lyrics with our invitations so people could learn them.

"But only a few people knew what we were planning to do so it was a bit of a surprise for some of the guests."

The couple admit to being fans of the 90s boyband Five, which is why they decided to use the song If Ya Gettin' Down.

"I don't know if we should admit to being fans of Five, but we saw the band in 2013, which is why we used this song," she said.

"We wanted to make the video as personal as we could, and we also believe we are the first people to use this song for a marryoke video."

The couple included superhereos in the video as Scott is a big comic book fan.

"Scott is a massive superhero fan as are all of his friends so it only seemed right for there to be some kind of superhero reference at the wedding," Felicity said.

"He also has a man room at home, which we have nicknamed The Marvel Suite due to all of his superhero pictures, Lego and figures. We had superhero stand-ups where we had our wedding breakfast and evening reception and some of the table names were also superhero themed."

A Walk In Love for groom Scott Mcloughlin

Scott, who is 30 and works as an accounts executive, met Felicity, 28, while she was working as a waitress at The Woodman pub in Codsall, near Pattingham, and in July the couple will be celebrating 11 years together.

The couple now live in Codsall, although Felicity, who now works as a housing officer, is originally from Telford, which is why they decided to get married in Shifnal on April 18.

"It was a great day and the guests loved taking part in our marryoke," she added. "The music was playing in the background so everyone could mime in time with the song. The weather was great as well so we could film most of it outside. And dancing in the dress was actually quite easy, but as you can see in the video I changed into a different dress for the evening."

The video was put together by Electra Wedding, which is based in Derbyshire.

It is just one of scores of video firms that have taken advantage of the craze for marryoke.

Competitive

They include husband and wife team Billy and Katie May, who set up their company Marryokes.com three years ago having made a wedding video for some friends as a present. It got 50,000 hits when they uploaded it onto YouTube and they realised that they were onto something.

Mr May said: "There has been a real shift in weddings. People are constantly looking for something that's unique so there's a real competitive element going on.

"People search for something different at their weddings, whether it's with the flowers, or the cake, the wedding favours or the video. There's also a social media element where people want to upload photos and videos of the day on Facebook or YouTube.

"There are all kinds of crazy things at weddings nowaways. We've seen elephants, magicians, helicopters, secret singers, all sorts. People are becoming less bothered about recording the speeches and the vows and are more interested in putting the highlights package on Facebook."

As for the songs, people tend to stay away from romantic tunes in favour of high-energy pop songs, including Black Eyed Peas I Gotta Feeling and Queen's Don't Stop Me Now.

l To watch Felicity and Scott's video visit www.expressandstar.com

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