Wedding DJ in
Holmdel & Hazlet

The near end
of Monmouth

The Bayshore is the strip of Monmouth County along Raritan Bay, and it is the closest part of the county to us — the Outerbridge lands in Perth Amboy, and Matawan, Aberdeen, Keyport, Hazlet, Holmdel and Middletown follow down the Parkway and Route 35 from there. The Reception Center is about thirty-five minutes from Staten Island and Addison Park about forty, which puts this whole corner at the near end of our Monmouth range.

We work The Gramercy at Lakeside Manor in Hazlet — one of the New Jersey rooms we return to most. Alongside it: Addison Park in Aberdeen, The Reception Center in Matawan, Yesterday's in Hazlet, The Barn on South Holland in Holmdel, and West Hills and Jacques in Middletown.

That matters to you for one practical reason. A DJ who has never been in your room is solving it for the first time on your wedding day. Where the booth goes, whether the ceiling will take uplighting, which wall the sound bounces off, how long the load-in really takes, where the ceremony audio has to live — those are answers worth having before the date rather than on it.

Getting here, and three
things the Bayshore changes

From the Outerbridge Crossing it is Route 440 to the Garden State Parkway south. Exit 120 serves Matawan and Aberdeen, Exit 117 is Keyport and Hazlet by way of Route 36, and Exit 114 is Holmdel. Route 35 runs the length of the Bayshore parallel to the Parkway; Route 36 branches off it at Keyport and runs east through Hazlet toward Middletown and the Highlands. The Gramercy sits at 410 Highway 36 South in Hazlet; Addison Park fronts Route 35 in Aberdeen. It is the shortest Monmouth drive we make, and we still load in early.

The Gramercy's room, and where we set up

The Gramercy's ballroom is 4,000 square feet for up to 300, under twenty-foot draped ceilings, with a lakeside pavilion outside for 250 and a staircase entrance worth building the introduction around. We set up directly across from the entrance to the room, which is why the floor fills from every direction rather than building out from one corner. Lighting is scaled to the actual ceiling height — uplighting that vanishes in this room is the most common mistake made here — and the pavilion and patio get coverage of their own, separate from the ballroom.

Addison Park scales from 75 to 800

Addison Park seats anywhere from seventy-five to eight hundred across its spaces, and which one you have booked changes the specification completely. We quote to the configuration rather than to a package. Ceremonies go outside, where open air has nothing to reflect off, so the ceremony gets its own speakers and its own operator — and the Route 35 frontage means ambient road noise during a quiet vow exchange, which is a microphone choice rather than a volume choice.

The catering-hall format at The Reception Center

The Reception Center in Matawan runs the format Monmouth and Staten Island share: a long cocktail hour in a separate room, a formal introduction into the ballroom, and a reception built around courses. The floor empties and refills four or five times, and each refill is its own decision rather than one long dance set. The risk is always cocktail hour running long because it is going well, so the timeline is agreed with the venue beforehand and the decision about what gets compressed is made by you in advance rather than at 8pm by whoever is nearest.

The Bayshore rooms
we've written up

Where we work a room often enough to have a real opinion about it, there's a page explaining how we set up and what the space actually needs:

• The Gramercy at Lakeside Manor — 410 Highway 36 South, Hazlet. A 4,000 square foot ballroom for up to 300 under twenty-foot draped ceilings, a lakeside pavilion for 250, and a staircase entrance.
• Addison Park — Route 35, Aberdeen. Seats 75 to 800 across its spaces; outdoor ceremonies as their own setup.
• The Reception Center — Matawan. A classic catering hall about thirty-five minutes from Staten Island; the timeline is the whole job.

Yesterday's in Hazlet, The Barn on South Holland in Holmdel, and West Hills and Jacques in Middletown we work without having written them up yet. Ask — tell us which room and we'll tell you what it needs. The wider county is on the Monmouth County wedding DJ page, and the full list of rooms we work is on the venues page.

On money: weddings start at $2,995 and everything is quoted per event, with travel inside the number from the start. What moves it here is which space you are in — 75 or 800 at Addison Park is not the same job — and whether the ceremony is outdoors and needs its own system. There's a fuller breakdown on what a wedding DJ costs.

Nearby areas
we cover

The Bayshore is the near end of a Monmouth and shore patch we work every weekend.