funeral music

R.E.M. – Find the River

27 February 2012
Charles
1 Comment
Categories: funeral music, music

 

Hey now, little speedyhead,
The read on the speedometer says
You have to go to task in the city
Where people drown and people serve
Don’t be shy. Your just dessert
Is only just light years to go

Me, my thoughts are flower strewn
Ocean storm, bayberry moon
I have got to leave to find my way
Watch the road and memorize
This life that passed before my eyes
Nothing is going my way

The ocean is the river’s goal,
A need to leave the water knows
We’re closer now than light years to go

I have got to find the river,
Bergamot and vetiver
Run through my head and fall away
Leave the road and memorize
This life that passed before my eyes
Nothing is going my way

There’s no one left to take the lead,
But I tell you and you can see
We’re closer now than light years to go
Pick up here and chase the ride
The river empties to the tide
Fall into the ocean

The river to the ocean goes,
A fortune for the undertow
None of this is going my way
There is nothing left to throw
Of ginger, lemon, indigo,
Coriander stem and rows of hay
Strength and courage overrides
The privileged and weary eyes
Of river poet search naivete
Pick up here and chase the ride
The river empties to the tide
All of this is coming your way

Quote of the day

27 February 2012
Charles
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Categories: funeral music, music, Quotes

 

 

“I chose the start of the overture from The Mikado as the music for my Dad’s funeral…..it was that, or his other favourite, Doris Day, but my Mum pointed out that everyone would think we were outing him, so G&S it was…”   Source

 

 

 

 

Thoughts of a funeral-goer

17 February 2012
Charles
2 Comments
Categories: ceremony, funeral, funeral music, Humanists, music, Plan your own funeral, Religious funerals, Thoughts of a funeralgoer

Posted by Lyra Mollington

The lovely Mr Cowling and his little friend Vale have kindly invited me to contribute to the splendid GFG. As a lady of a certain age, I have attended more than my fair share of funerals, becoming something of a connoisseur.

I have also attended more than my fair share of dreadful funerals. On one occasion we were regaled with threats of hell and damnation by an intense and possibly psychopathic lady vicar. She clearly warmed to her theme as she saw our horrified faces. We were her ideal audience – unable to escape.

The humanists are only slightly better – why do they have to mention religion so much? Yes, we get it – you can have a funeral without God. And yes, you mean no disrespect to those of a religious faith. Get a grip for heaven’s sake! We’re not going to fall apart because you’re unable to wax lyrical about Life Everlasting. However, I do miss a good hymn. As long as it’s not All Things Bright & Beautiful! Unless the organist is playing it in the key of C, at my age I have no hope of reaching the top notes. But even that is better than Wind Beneath My Wings. Does no-one listen to the lyrics?

Anyway, it got me thinking. What if my children chose something like that for my funeral. Plan ahead – that’s the key. So whilst we were tucking into our crispy duck in restaurant in China Town, I tentatively raised the subject of my demise. It went something like this:

Me: I’ve been thinking about my funeral.

Daughter: (imagine high-pitched disapproval) Mum! We’re eating!

Me: Well we don’t often get the chance to talk like this. I just wanted…

Son: (fingers in ears) Not listening. Not listening.

Me: I’ll write it all down then.

Daughter: Fine – but it’s not legally binding you know.

Son: (starting to chuckle) Yeah, but don’t worry – we’ve got lots of ideas.

Later that evening we saw Bill Bailey’s Work In Progress and everyone howled with laughter when he sang the first few notes of “I Will Always Love You…”

Now that’s another song I don’t want at my funeral. Does no-one listen to the lyrics?

Ed’s note: the first two lines are: ‘If I should stay, / I would only be in your way.’ A very good point you make, Ms Mollington. 

Street Spirit

16 February 2012
Charles
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Categories: funeral music, music

Rows of houses, all bearing down on me
I can feel their blue hands touching me
All these things into position
All these things we’ll one day swallow whole
And fade out again and fade out

This machine will, will not communicate
These thoughts and the strain I am under
Be a world child, form a circle
Before we all go under
And fade out again and fade out again

Cracked eggs, dead birds
Scream as they fight for life
I can feel death, can see its beady eyes
All these things into position
All these things we’ll one day swallow whole
And fade out again and fade out again

Immerse your soul in love
IMMERSE YOUR SOUL IN LOVE

Take him, earth, for cherishing

15 February 2012
Charles
2 Comments
Categories: Committal, funeral music

Tony Piper, a very good friend of the GFG, whose wise and gentle counsel we value incredibly highly, sang these words the other night at a concert London. 

As he did so he wondered “What would be the most moving and powerful words of committal we could find, courtesy the GFG blog?”

The words are from a 4th-century poem by Aurelius Clemens Prudentius, translated by Helen Waddell. The music is by Herbert Howells. The piece commemorates Howells’ dead son. 

Have you got anything to rival this? 

Take him, earth, for cherishing,
to thy tender breast receive him.
Body of a man I bring thee,
noble even in its ruin.

Once was this a spirit’s dwelling,
by the breath of God created.
High the heart that here was beating,
Christ the prince of all its living.

Guard him well, the dead I give thee,
not unmindful of his creature
shall he ask it: he who made it
symbol of his mystery.

Comes the hour God hath appointed
to fulfil the hope of men,
then must thou, in very fashion,
what I give, return again.

Not though ancient time decaying
wear away these bones to sand,
ashes that a man might measure
in the hollow of his hand:

Not though wandering winds and idle,
drifting through the empty sky,
scatter dust was nerve and sinew,
is it given to man to die.

Once again the shining road
leads to ample Paradise;
open are the woods again,
that the serpent lost for men

Take, O take him, mighty leader,
take again thy servant’s soul.
Grave his name, and pour the fragrant
balm upon the icy stone.

Time It’s Time

13 February 2012
Charles
2 Comments
Categories: funeral music, music

Nobody knows how long
Rustling leaves unrhyme
Lullaby breeze unsung
Babel of dreams
unwinds in memory

As bad as bad becomes
It’s not a part of you
And love is only sleeping
Wrapped in neglect

Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live through the pain
Time it’s time to live
now that it’s all over
Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live through the pain
now that it’s over,
now that it’s over

Kissing a grey garden
Shadow & shade
Sunlight treads softly

As bad as bad becomes
It’s not a part of you
Contempt is ever breeding
Trapped in itself

Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live through the pain
Time it’s time to live
now that it’s all over
Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live through the pain
now that it’s over,
now that it’s over,
now that it’s over

(Instrumental)

As bad as bad becomes
It’s not a part of you
The wicked and the weeping
Ramble or run

Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live for living
Time it’s time to live
Now that it’s all over
Time it’s time to live,
Time it’s time to live for living
Time it’s time to live
Now that it’s all over

Now that it’s over,
Now that it’s over

Now that it’s over

Now that it’s over

Rest your head

Brass is best

13 February 2012
Charles
No comments
Categories: funeral music, music

Lawrence Ferlinghetti wrote a poem about them. Novelist Amy Tan’s mother was serenaded by them as she lay in state. Muckraker Jessica Mitford’s memorial procession was led by them. And more than 300 Chinese families a year hire the Green Street Mortuary Band to give their loved ones a proper and musical send-off through the streets of Chinatown.

The band traces its roots back to 1911 and the Cathay Chinese Boys Band, the first marching group in Chinatown. For more than 50 years, this amateur band performed for its community at nearly every big event: Chinese New Year’s, the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge, Confucius’ Birthday, the 1939 World’s Fair and many elaborate funeral processions. [Source]

If you enjoyed the brass band in Saturday’s film of a Catholic funeral in Tonga here, you’ll love the Green Street Mortuary Band. It plays for Chinese funerals in San Francisco. The repertoire is Christian hymns accompanied by strong percussion and sporadic outbreaks of gong-smiting to frighten off evil spirits. 

What, Christian hymns at a Chinese funeral?

Yes. Years ago the Chinese heard British military bands in Hong Kong. They liked the sound. Enough said. A marvellous, mildly crazy custom was born. 

We last featured the Green Street Mortuary Band back in 2008, when our readership probably didn’t include you. 

Ain’t it brilliant?! 

Vicar says no

23 January 2012
Charles
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Categories: funeral music, music

“The only time I have turned any request for a song down was the occasion I was asked to take a funeral for an elderly gentleman and they want to play “Relax” as he was brought in. I reckon I am about as liberal they come on some issues but even I could not maintain my dignity walking down the nave to such interesting lyrics.”

Clerical Guardian commenter Stiffkey here.

Jazz requiem

12 January 2012
Charles
2 Comments
Categories: Art and death, bereavement, funeral music, funeral poetry

Posted by Vale

This lovely jazz piece was actually a requiem for Charlie Parker – but at risk of offending purists I thought Frank O’Hara’s poem for Billie Holiday on the day she died fitted perfectly with the music.

The Day Lady Died

It is 12:20 in New York a Friday
three days after Bastille day, yes
it is 1959 and I go get a shoeshine
because I will get off the 4:19 in Easthampton
at 7:15 and then go straight to dinner
and I don’t know the people who will feed me

I walk up the muggy street beginning to sun
and have a hamburger and a malted and buy
an ugly NEW WORLD WRITING to see what the poets
in Ghana are doing these days

I go on to the bank
and Miss Stillwagon (first name Linda I once heard)
doesn’t even look up my balance for once in her life
and in the GOLDEN GRIFFIN I get a little Verlaine
for Patsy with drawings by Bonnard although I do
think of Hesiod, trans. Richmond Lattimore or
Brendan Behan’s new play or Le Balcon or Les Nègres
of Genet, but I don’t, I stick with Verlaine
after practically going to sleep with quandariness

and for Mike I just stroll into the PARK LANE
Liquor Store and ask for a bottle of Strega and
then I go back where I came from to 6th Avenue
and the tobacconist in the Ziegfeld Theatre and
casually ask for a carton of Gauloises and a carton
of Picayunes, and a NEW YORK POST with her face on it

and I am sweating a lot by now and thinking of
leaning on the john door in the 5 SPOT
while she whispered a song along the keyboard
to Mal Waldron and everyone and I stopped breathing