The investment
What you are paying for is the moment the room lets go.
It comes at every kind of night. The toasts finish at a wedding, the last award goes out at the company party, the candles come off a sixtieth birthday cake. The lights drop, the next song lands a beat before anyone expects it, and a room that was being polite a minute ago is on its feet. Nobody there sees the decision that made it happen. Making that call, at that second, is the job.
Rob Kermidas earned that timing in eight years behind the decks in Binghamton, New York: nightclubs, corporate events and college parties. He moved to Knoxville in 2016, worked in event marketing alongside MTV and GMR, and founded Midas Entertainment in 2022. Today he designs every night with a team built to the same standard: Coty Tate as a second DJ, his brother Dan beside him at his own events, and Willie Robb on the sound desk when a band takes the stage.
By the time your first guest walks in, the microphones are tested and the timeline is written, and the drive, anywhere within two hours of Lenoir City, is already in the price.
Pick your night
Weddings
From $1,500
From vows the back row can hear to the last song of the night, one written timeline and one voice on the microphone.
Compare the two packages
Corporate events
Quoted on the brief
Awards called on cue, speeches heard at the back of the room, and a party that starts the moment the formal part ends.
How it is quoted
Parties and private events
Quoted on the brief
Birthdays, anniversaries, retirements and reunions: the nights when three generations end up on the same floor.
How it is quotedWeddings
Two DJs. Neither of them is the backup.
Which one plays your wedding comes down to two things, and you will hear both on the first call: whether Rob’s date is free, and what you have to spend. Either way you plan the night with Rob, either way it runs off the same written run of show, and the contract names your DJ before you sign it.
Full Day with Rob
from $2,500
Founder and lead DJ, with his brother Dan beside him all night.
- Six hours of DJ performance time
- Ceremony audio engineering with a ceremony PA system and two wireless lavalier microphones, for the officiant and the groom
- Everything battery operated for the ceremony, so it can happen where you dream it, not where the outlets are
- Cocktail hour PA system
- Reception PA system with turntables
- DJ booth with a wireless microphone system for toasts and speeches
- Live one-on-one planning with Rob
- Access to the Entertainment Planning Guide, so nothing gets missed
- A two-person team on the day: Rob and his brother Dan
- Setup, takedown and travel included
In Rob’s words: the two-person team “makes ALL the difference”. It is also the package with the ceremony engineered on battery power, which is what lets a ceremony happen somewhere with no outlet.
Full Day with Coty
from $1,500
Second in command, and the same six-hour day from the same playbook.
- Six hours of DJ performance time
- Ceremony audio with a ceremony PA system and two wireless lavalier microphones, for the officiant and the groom
- Cocktail hour PA system
- Reception PA system with a DJ controller
- DJ booth with a wireless microphone system for toasts and speeches
- Live one-on-one planning
- Access to the Entertainment Planning Guide, so nothing gets missed
- Setup, takedown and travel included
Rob calls him “incredible”, and Rob is not loose with words like that. The differences are real and worth knowing: he works on his own rather than as a two-person team, on a controller rather than turntables, and his ceremony rig runs on mains power rather than batteries. The planning, the run of show and the standard on the microphone are the same.
Up to six hours of performance time in either package. A shorter day is the same price, because the planning, the load-in and the setup are the same job whether the dancing runs four hours or six.
The wedding day with Rob
Speakers are the cheap part.
Every DJ in East Tennessee owns them. What you are paying for is the judgment standing in front of them: the call at half past nine that turns a polite room into the one your friends are still describing at Christmas, and the four hours before the doors opened that nobody ever sees.
Your vows happen where you pictured them
Ceremony sound runs entirely on battery, so a ridge with no power for half a mile is a place you can get married rather than a place you had to rule out. Two wireless lavaliers, one on your officiant and one on the groom, so the words reach the back row instead of the front three.
Two people, so the room is never unwatched
Rob works every one of his events with his brother Dan. One of them is always reading the floor while the other is moving a microphone, resetting for the next moment, or solving the thing nobody told you about. A solo DJ has to choose which of those to do.
Three rooms, three sound systems, one run of show
The ceremony, the cocktail hour and the reception are three different acoustic problems and they get three different setups. What ties them together is a written run of show, built with you on a real call, and shared with your photographer and your coordinator so the whole room is working from one timeline.
The toast everybody actually hears
A wireless handheld that has already been tested, in the hand of someone who has been told how to hold it. The speeches are the part of the night people quote back to you for years, and they are also the part most often lost to a microphone nobody checked.
The floor moves with the room
Give Rob around twenty songs and he builds the rest of the evening on top of them, live, watching who is up and who is reaching for their coat. That judgment is the entire job and it is the one part of it that cannot be bought in a box.
You never see the work
Load-in, setup, sound check, strike and travel are inside the price. The gear is in the room and tested before a single guest arrives, and it is gone before you have finished saying goodbye to anyone.
Corporate events and parties
Not everything has a number on it, and here is why.
A wedding is a known shape. Six hours, a ceremony, a room, a floor, and the same arc every time, which is why it carries a published price.
A company night is not. An awards dinner for sixty people in a hotel suite and a holiday party for three hundred in a converted foundry need different rigs, different microphone work and a different number of hands, and a price list that pretended otherwise would be wrong for one of them and expensive for the other. Same for a sixtieth birthday against a school prom.
So those get quoted properly instead: Rob reads what the evening has to do, and comes back with a number rather than a range. It takes a day, not a week, and nobody tries to sell you a bigger one on the way.
The people are the same ones. Rob or Coty behind the booth and on the microphone, named on the contract, and Rob planning the evening with you either way.
Send these four things
With these in the first message, Rob can usually come back with a real number the same day rather than a set of questions.
- The date, and whether it is fixed or still moving.
- The venue, or the town if the room is not booked yet.
- Roughly how many people, and whether they are seated or standing.
- What the evening has to do. Awards and speeches, a dance floor, background music through dinner, or all three.
Not asked, at any point: your budget. You will be shown a number before anybody asks you what you had in mind.
A band on the bill
Live sound, from one PA to a full stage.
Plenty of weddings and company nights book a band as well as a DJ. The band still needs somebody at the desk, and on this team that is Willie Robb: the system sized to the room, monitors set so the players can hear themselves, and the mix judged from the floor rather than the stage.
Band jobs usually run between $2,000 and $7,000. The size of the stage decides where yours lands.
The rates
- $2,000 PA system, set up for your band
- $3,000 PA system, with Willie running sound
- $5,000+ Full stage production, lighting and audio
Then there is the room
What your venue could look like at ten o’clock.
None of this is required and none of it is a package you have to take whole. It is the difference between a photograph of a hall with people in it and a photograph you put on a wall.
Rob designs it against your room, your colors or your brand, and your photographer’s plan, then delivers, installs and runs it on the same load-in. Each one is quoted with the venue, because a barn and a ballroom are not the same job.
- Complete venue lighting design
The room you walk into at six is not the room you dance in at ten. Uplighting around the walls and moving light over the floor, designed together as one look rather than bought as two line items.
- Twenty-two inch mirror ball
A real one, not an effect. It does something to a room that a moving head cannot, and everybody over forty knows exactly what it is.
Venue uplighting
Every photograph taken after sunset is taken in this light. A plain hall with the overheads down and warm color up the walls stops photographing like a hall.
How it works
Dance floor lighting
It arrives with the first dance rather than running since six. Rob cues it from the booth, because the person choosing the song is the person who knows what is coming.
How it works
Custom monogram
Your names in light on the floor or the wall, drawn with you before the day. Small, and in the background of a hundred photographs.
How it works
Digital photo booth
The part guests take home, on their phone before they have left the booth. No printer to jam at nine o’clock and no line behind it.
How it works
Cold spark fountains
The shot everybody posts. Indoor safe, no flame, no smoke. Used once, for one moment, because used all night it is wallpaper.
How it works
Bistro and fairy lighting
Warm light overhead where there was none, and a tent stops being a tent. Quoted on the room, because the hang decides the job.
How it worksBefore you sign anything
The part most vendors leave for the contract.
None of this is exciting and all of it is the difference between a night that runs and a night that does not. It is here rather than three pages into a PDF because you should be able to check it before you are emotionally committed.
Additional hours are $400 each, the same rate whichever DJ is playing, and anything in the list to the right that needs explaining, Rob will explain on the call rather than after the deposit.
The practical part
- Travel is included within two hours of Lenoir City.
- Setup, sound check and strike are inside the price, not beside it.
- A written contract fixing the date, the hours, the price and the DJ.
- Fully insured, with a certificate to your venue on request.
Before you ask
The questions that usually come next.
Will Rob be the DJ at my event, or does he send someone else?
You choose, and the contract names who is coming. There are two DJs: Rob, the owner, who works every booking with his brother Dan, and Coty Tate, Rob’s second in command, who works solo. They are priced differently and both are on the pricing page. Rob is the person you plan with either way. Nobody is assigned to your date that you have not met on paper first.
How much does a wedding DJ cost in Knoxville?
With Midas Entertainment, a wedding day of up to six hours starts at $2,500 with Rob and his brother Dan, or $1,500 with Coty Tate. Both include ceremony audio, the cocktail hour, the reception, wireless microphones for toasts, one-on-one planning, and setup, takedown and travel. Lighting, the photo booth, cold sparks and a monogram go on top, each one quoted with the venue. For context, The Knot’s most recent survey put the national average wedding DJ at $1,800.
How much does a DJ cost for a corporate event or a party?
It is quoted on the evening rather than listed, because an awards dinner for sixty and a holiday party for three hundred are different jobs. Send the date, the venue, roughly how many people and what the night has to do, and Rob comes back with one number. Additional hours are $400 each, whichever DJ is playing.
Can you run sound for a live band?
Yes. Willie Robb leads live audio for the team. A PA set up for your band is $2,000, with Willie running sound it is $3,000, and full stage production, lighting and audio together, starts at $5,000. Most band work falls between $2,000 and $7,000, depending on the size of the event.
How far in advance should we book?
Earlier than you think. In Rob’s words, from his own guide: “Many DJs like myself tend to book 9 to 18 months out, and in some cases two years out, so do not delay in finding your DJ.” Peak-season Saturdays go first. Send the date and find out.
Is there a contract?
Yes, always. In Rob’s words, “a contract protects both you the customer and myself.” It fixes the date, the hours, the price and what is included, so nothing about the booking depends on either side remembering a conversation.
Know the number? Check the date.
The price only matters if the date is free. Send it and Rob will tell you himself, along with anything the room changes.