Guides
The Knot’s list of thirty-six questions to ask a wedding band includes, as its own numbered item, how much space do you need for yourself and your gear. The guidance underneath is to ask the band so you can plan appropriately. That is the complete answer, on the highest-traffic page in the category.
Meanwhile the published stage-sizing tables, which are the other place you might look, start at a five to eight piece band needing 320 square feet. There is no row for a three or four piece anywhere in them, which is most of the bands actually working private events. So the question gets asked constantly and answered nowhere. Here is what can be said about it, and what to ask instead.
A live band’s stage footprint and its power draw are two separate questions, and the power one is decided by how many circuits reach the stage rather than by how many outlets are on the wall.
Less than the published guidance suggests, and the honest version of the answer is that it depends on the band. A three or four piece with its own PA needs a fraction of what a ten-piece with horns and a full backline does, and the industry’s own sizing tables do not have a row for the smaller end at all.
So the useful thing is not a single number. It is knowing which questions produce one: how many people, whether they bring their own PA and lights, and where those have to sit relative to the dance floor. A band that cannot answer the first two without checking is worth noticing.
Rental companies publish sizing guidance by group size. This is a representative one, and it is useful as far as it goes.
| Stage | Square feet | Published for |
|---|---|---|
| 8 x 12 | 96 | Single speaker with a podium |
| 16 x 12 | 192 | A panel of speakers |
| 16 x 20 | 320 | 5 to 8 piece band |
| 16 x 24 | 384 | 8 to 10 piece band |
| 20 x 20 | 400 | 8 to 10 piece band, square |
| 16 x 28 | 448 | 10 to 12 piece band |
Notice the gap. The table goes from a podium straight to a five-piece, and the smallest band row it offers is already 320 square feet. If you are hiring a trio or a quartet and working from that table, you are budgeting for roughly twice the platform you need.
Three words worth defining, because the whole thing turns on them. A branch circuit is one run of wire from the panel to a set of outlets, protected by one breaker. Amperage is how much current that circuit can carry. A continuous load is the part almost nobody applies to live music.
Explaining the National Electrical Code, Schneider Electric notes that section 210.20(A) requires a branch circuit breaker to handle the noncontinuous load plus 125% of the continuous load, and defines the term precisely: “A continuous load is one where the maximum current is expected to continue for 3 hours or more.”
A band playing an evening meets that definition. Doors at seven, finished at eleven, with the PA energised the whole time. So the usual derating applies, and the arithmetic changes.
20 amps at 120 volts is 2,400 watts. Two of those and the band has 4,800 watts to work with, which sounds like plenty for anybody.
Treat it as continuous and the working figure is 80 percent, so about 16 amps and 1,920 watts per circuit. Still usually enough, but it is a fifth less than the number people planned around.
The arithmetic there is ours. The code section and the definition are Schneider’s summary of NFPA 70, and your venue’s own electrician is the authority on what its panel can actually do. We are musicians, not electricians.
Not “are there outlets”. Outlets tell you nothing, because six of them can sit on one circuit. Ask:
A band on its own circuit is almost never the thing that trips a breaker. A band sharing a circuit with a chafing dish and eight uplights is a completely different situation, and it is the common one.
Once you have the numbers, the rest of the venue conversation is in house sound system or band-provided PA, and the timing side is in how long a band needs to load in.
Considerably less than the published tables imply. Stage sizing guidance starts at a five to eight piece band at 320 square feet and offers no row below that, so a trio working from it will budget for roughly twice the platform it needs. Ask the band directly, and ask whether the figure includes its PA and lighting stands.
That is the wrong question. Ask how many separate circuits serve the stage area and what else is running on them. Catering warmers and uplighting sharing a circuit with the band is a far more common cause of trouble than the band’s own draw.
Rarely on its own. A band playing all evening counts as a continuous load under the electrical code, which means about 1,920 usable watts on a standard 20 amp circuit rather than 2,400. Trouble almost always comes from sharing that circuit with something else.
Ask about the setlist, the show, or what we need from your venue. If you want a date looked at, I can send it straight to the band.