Katy Perry Will Sing at Your Wedding for Less Than $1.9 Million

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Why pay a cover artist when you can get the real deal?

There’s now an industry devoted entirely to booking pop stars for anything from bar mitzvahs to corporate parties, MarketWatch says.

One such company is Hollywood Pop, whose “concerts have featured such notable performers as John Mellencamp, Tony Bennett, Katy Perry, Olivia Newton-John, Seal, Donna Summer, Earth Wind & Fire, and Bon Jovi,” its website says.

You can see photos and video of those and other private events the company planned, but you won’t find prices mentioned anywhere on the site. So what does it cost to party with a pop star?

The cost to hire Christina Aguilera and Robin Williams is more than $1 million each, MarketWatch says, and George Michael once did a New Year’s Eve performance for $3 million.

You can apparently buy in bulk to save, just like us normal folk do. Defense contractor David H. Brooks paid $10 million to snag 50 Cent, Aerosmith, Don Henley, Tom Petty and Stevie Nicks for his daughter’s bat mitzvah, MarketWatch says. (That’s cheap compared with the $61 million he was ordered to forfeit as a result of an insider trading conviction.)

Katy Perry did a wedding last year for a reported $1.9 million, MarketWatch says. But Hollywood Pop’s director of special events, Brett Galley, told the site that “sounds just a little bit high,” and she could probably be hired for less. That’s the advantage of having an agent, MarketWatch says.

The site has some other advice in case you ever want to save on a celebrity booking. Acclaimed but still rising-to-fame stars may charge only five figures, for instance, and you can get a discount if your party happens to fall along the route a celeb is currently taking on tour. Plan your birthday accordingly.

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