Will Taylor & Strings Attached

Wow! You are amazing, Wll! and Libby Kirkpatrick is one of my favs as you know. and beautiful Karen is such a talent! Thank you for the inspiration. Loved! loved! loved! your show!

I had my reservations about booking a live band, and unfortunately all of my fears came true. Let me start by saying the string duo at the ceremony were great — I have no issues there. But to be completely honest, I would never recommend the dance variety band.
Our initial agreement, per email and phone discussion with them was for 4 hours with the 5-​piece dance band and 1 hour with the violin and cello at the ceremony. Our entire wedding was from 6−11pm, so this initial agreement should have covered the evening. But as we didn’t initially have the cocktail hour in that contract, we agreed to pay an additional amount to cover it.
They had me fill out the wedding planner to indicate the schedule for the band — we indicated what time our wedding party would be entering and we also told them that the bride and groom would go straight into our first dance. However, the band had no idea they were supposed to play our first dance and didn’t know what song it was. Furthermore, they weren’t even set up yet, so our wedding party ended up waiting in the hallway until they finished. Not major issues, but certainly annoying and unnecessarily stressful. I will say that our wedding pictures show only three band members present and playing our first song.
We finally made our entrance and did our first dance. We go to sit down, and dinner service kicks off. Rather than continue to play music, the band disappears entirely. We go most of the dinner service with the band’s computer playing. This trend unfortunately continues most of the night. The worst part is that out of the four hours of service, plus the extra cocktail hour, for which we had paid… the band probably played maybe 45 minutes to an hour total. I don’t know if they even got through all 10 songs we requested. And even when they did play, they weren’t bad, but they weren’t that great either. Don’t be fooled by their recorded songs on their website. We actually found out a week before the wedding that most of the songs listed on their website were not available for them to play. The actual list of songs we got to choose from pretty much only included Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, and Stevie Wonder. While I love all of these, «Communication Breakdown» isn’t exactly a song that gets people up and dancing. Had I known that the song list was so limited, I would have chosen a different band or even just a DJ.
And while I know we agreed to provide plated meals for the band, we didn’t intend for them to make such use of our bar. Every time I looked up, I saw a band member or two grabbing a drink and then walking out of the reception site. I don’t know where the band spent most of the evening, but it certainly wasn’t entertaining our guests.
Finally, and I can’t believe I have to say this, but some of the band members should really think about how to conduct themselves professionally when they are at a wedding. One of their band members, in discussing how to use the microphone for speeches with me, decided it was appropriate to make a crude joke about oral sex, complete with obscene gestures. I didn’t find it entertaining to begin with, but the fact that a table of elderly family members were right behind us when he decided to do this made it even less humorous.
What kills me is that we paid so much to get a live band, but ended up with mostly canned iPod music. Even multiple guests commented on how absent the band was from the reception, and even that they didn’t play much at the cocktail hour either. I would really like to know what happened and how they can justify charging so much for such bad service.
Will Taylor was for the most part unavailable during the planning process. After the wedding, my husband tried to discuss the matter privately with him, but Will was completely unprofessional, trying to make us feel bad about the fact that they didn’t provide the service that we paid for. He agreed to issue a refund for the service the band failed to provide but then continued to dodge emails and calls after the fact, thus resulting in this review.
I really thought this band would be the highlight of our wedding. In reality, they caused us so much needless stress and are the only, ONLY thing I would change about our wedding day. Avoid at all costs unless you want a mediocre band, with both limited song selection and professionalism. Feel free to message me for more details.

We hired the Strings Attached string quartet to play our wedding ceremony. It should have been a red flag that the only way I could get a hold of him was through text. A couple months before the wedding I was sent a form to complete (that I had to reach out to get) about which specific songs I wanted played during each part of the ceremony. I sent it back and everything seemed like it was fine. The day of the wedding rolls around, and I can’t really speak to the quality of the songs since I didn’t hear anything except the song I was to walk down to.
Which, let me preface this– I chose this specific song because my grandfather used to sing it to my grandmother who recently passed away. I get up there and hear that my song is already ending! They had switched my song with the wedding party’s! I was pretty flustered and before I could ask them to just start again I had been shoved down the aisle by my wedding planner (whole other story). Anyway the wedding was still amazing and I get to spend my life with my best friend BUT wanted to warn anyone else if they choose to use Will make sure you are VERY thorough. Especially if you have music that has sentimental value.
PS– another red flag: my wedding planner recommended them who I incidentally don’t recommend as well…

I had the same experience as Kristin. My husbands family are professional musicians and I wanted to spare no expense for live music at my wedding. I contacted their booking agent Amanda and of course the booking party (and paying) was easy. Mind you that they were expensive and we were sparing no expense. Once they had our money I didn’t hear anything from them. Actually meeting will Taylor or speaking to anyone from the actual band was not an option. Rather then discussing the music playlist I was sent a form to fill our online which asked what you would/​would not like to hear. I specifically asked that they NOT Play my divorced parents wedding song– that’s what this form was for right? A week before the wedding and after several unreturned phone calls, I got a call from Will. Again, a short conversation about the «type» of music to play… No specifics, and I had to just expect that they would be good.
I wasn’t at the cocktail hour, but from what I’ve heard they weren’t bad. The actual wedding reception was a disaster. The sound wasn’t great (although the voices seemed ok), and they looked a bit rough around the edges.
…and guess what they played– my divorced parents wedding song. The one song I asked them repetitively NOT to play. Verbally and on their forms.
You only get married once, and that was my experience. At least our wedding song was a recording so they didn’t ruin that too.

My wife and I attended the ‘Strings on Grass’ concert by ‘Strings Attached’ with guest artists: Libby Kirkpatrick, Anthony DeCosta, and featuring Jimmy LaFave. It was a delight. An informal house concert in the backyard with an adoring audience, and great musicians having a great time performing and improvising accompaniments.
I forgot how powerful live performances are with the spontaneity and joy that goes with it.
It was a perfect date night with my wife.

This was definitely not the review I thought I would be writing about this group when I hired them 6 months out from our May wedding. My husband & I are both trained musicians & while we don’t play currently music is a huge part of our lives. When we were looking at wedding costs ceremony music came up in the «spare no expense» category. Besides ceremony music we were having a sit down meal & I thought it would be nice to have strings playing while we ate, Dealing with them was such a massive headache & quite honestly for professionals I have not dealt with people who have acted more unprofessionally
There was breakdown in this whole process almost from the start & I probably should have caught it but a million things go on at once when you are wedding planning. This group was supposed to be my easy decision. My husband & I had chosen non-​traditional music for our ceremony & when I hadn’t heard from them about a month from the wedding I was getting a little nervous. I knew they were going to have to learn new pieces. I got shuffled between different people because apparently no one was in charge of handling our wedding & 2 weeks from our date when I finally got someone on the phone it was to be pretty much yelled at for 45 minutes for not «trusting them», for «doubting their professionalism» & to hear every excuse in the book for why I hadn’t gotten a single email or phone call including the fact that they were busy with wedding season. It was pretty ridiculous although I will give them some credit for finally slowing down & sorting out the contract when I decided I did not want them to play for our reception. I still overpaid them for their time but I let it go because I needed to get off the phone.
All of that alone would have been bad enough — I had told my wedding planner at this point that I did not want to speak to them day of the wedding at all — then Will himself actually called me to talk about my music program. I would have been so happy for that call on any day in the previous 3 months but I got that call literally as I was walking out the door to my rehearsal dinner. He seemed to have no ideal what I had talked to the booking manager about & it was clear they hadn’t worked on the music at all despite the angry protests the week before that they had been working so hard on my wedding. To add insult to injury Will was very clearly frustrated that at 5:00 pm the day before my wedding I didn’t have time to sit on the phone & go through my ceremony music piece by piece. Like I said — completely unprofessional & I will steer anyone I know away from this group. It’s not worth the ensuing stress.

I can’t say enough positive things about Strings Attached and their professionalism during our wedding April 27! Communicating with them prior to the event and setting up what we wanted was one of the easiest parts of the entire planning process. They showed up the day-​of on time and in place. A member of the quartet came to me, the groom, about half an hour before to just go over and confirm they had everything right. Once the ceremony began, every song was played at just the right moment and sounded absolutely beautiful. Strings Attached was a major part of making our wedding so special and beautiful and I highly reccommend them for anyone considering a string quartet!

We were very pleased with the service we received from Will Taylor and Strings Attached. They arrived to the event early, made sure they set up where we needed them, and warmed up without distracting the rest of the set-​up. They were very professionally dressed in tuxedos as agreed upon. They played beautifully and were an integral part of the success of the event. I would not hesitate to recommend them to anyone.

An incredible group of musicians. They have a wonderful mastery of their art and every show I’ve seen has been top notch. Well worth checking out!

Will Taylor & Strings attached played the ceremony music for my wedding. After picking out and submitting the songs I wanted to have played, my church provided us with some restrictions, which affected the selections we had already made. Will was very accommodating with our changes, and everyone was blown away at the incredible combination of classic rock and church appropriate music that he was able to put together! I would not hesitate to hire them for another event in the future!

We used Will Taylor and Strings Attached for our wedding. They provided ceremony and cocktail hour music — I believe we had a cello and violin for the ceremony, and a violin, piano, and bass for the cocktail hour. They also provided the full band for our dinner and dancing reception.
The music was one of my favorite parts of this very special evening! Everyone at our wedding danced the night away, and we had constant comments from people asking who the fantastic band was. I literally did not sit down all night!
Will was very professional, organized, and easy to work with in the months leading up to the wedding. They listened to our requests and let us know what they could do to make the evening a blast for everyone. They took only a couple small breaks during the night, and at those times they helped us hook up our ipod so we could play music during the breaks. They even learned a special song for our first dance and performed it amazingly well — I will never forget it.
I truly think the band made our reception and would recommend them to anyone!

Its hard to keep my comments short… From the moment that we contacted Will Taylor, we knew this was the band for us.
While my wife’s family is from Austin, our wedding in Austin was more of a destination wedding given where everyone else was coming from. Because of this, we really went all out in creating a weekend to really showcase Austin. We had a rehearsal dinner planned at Thurman’s Mansion at the Salt Lick on Saturday night and wanted a band that could deliver an upbeat classic rock style show, but also needed a band for our Sunday brunch reception at the Four Seasons which we wanted an acoustic and intimate performance for, so we couldn’t decide if we needed to book two bands, but hoped we could find one person who could handle everything. We are huge music fans and were very particular in what we were looking for each night, and even had a particular song that we wanted played for our first dance that was a little out of the ordinary, so we knew the band would need to learn it.
We reached out to multiple bands that were referred to us and some that we found on our own. We found Will Taylor after seeing him listed both on the Four Seasons website and on The Knot. After listening to some performances we were confident that he would be able to handle both events.
From the moment we contacted Will and his representatives, we were treated with the utmost professionalism and good Austin nature that we were looking for. After explaining what we were looking for, they were able to come up with a plan for both events using an array of their musicians. We set up a Saturday night «electric» show featuring a 5 piece band that covered classic rock and Texas country favorites that dazzled the crowd for 3 solid hours. For Sunday, Will put together an acoustic group with Karen Mal as the lead singer that could not have been better suited for a Four Seasons Brunch on a Sunday morning.
While you may be reading this and saying «how much did that cost you?», Will was very attentive to our budget and we were able to find common ground on a price for both events that in retrospect I consider an incredible value! I would recommend Will Taylor and Strings Attached to anyone, for any event. The professionalism that they showed, setting up without any instruction, and adapting to whatever we threw at them, far exceeded any expectation that we had.
Please feel free to contact me at
if you have any additional questions about our experiences with Will Taylor.

They are such a fun group to hear play! We had several of their members play our wedding, and everyone loved them. Since then, we go to see them play out whenever we can. They are seriously amazing musicians, great with the crowd and a really fun night out.

I’ve been a big fan of Will Taylor and Strings Attached for a long time and I’ve finally gotten to work with him. I handed him a rough mix of a song in progress and he turned it into gold! I’d work with them again in a heartbeat.