Wedding Singer

Subject: Wedding Singer
From:
Date: 29 Apr 02 - 09:43 PM

Hi there! I wonder if any of you singers out there can help me. I'm singing at a wedding in September and I'm looking for some suggestions as to what to sing.

Have you heard anything that worked really well at a wedding, or do you just have an idea what might work? I'm thinking reasonably mainstream, heartfelt, but not too cliched.

I'd really appreciate any and all suggestions. (Duets could work as my girlfriend is interested too)(in singing, not marriage).

Thanks y'all!

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Celtic Soul
Date: 29 Apr 02 - 09:56 PM

Wow...depends on the taste of the couple, I would think. Some people want traditional and go with "Ave Maria". Some people want contemporary and want something like "The Wedding Song". Some people want classical and like "Pacelbels Canon". Some people want doo wop (yup...I sang doo wop *during* a ceremony for a friend).

So, find out what they want for their wedding, and then tailor the music from there.

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Sorcha
Date: 29 Apr 02 - 10:01 PM

I was going to say---ask the bride and groom........we can't choose exact pieces for someone we don't know. Some will be be happy with Maire's Wedding. I wanted Roll in My Sweet Baby's Arms, but my mum vetoed it. Settled for Morning Has Broken and Joy of Man's Desiring.

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: catspaw49
Date: 29 Apr 02 - 11:09 PM

Enter the word wedding in the filter box and set the refresh for the longest possible years and you'll come up with a bunch of threads with ideas on them.

Spaw

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 Apr 02 - 11:22 PM

Well, the four (remaining) men in the church choir sang for our wedding reception. They did Can't Help Falling in Love With You and Cole Porter's True Love. I sang along, and danced with my bride. Those guys couldn't have chosen anything better. To get people settled down before the ceremony, the matron of honor played Pacelbel's Canon on the violin with a piano accompaniment.

We sang Noel Paul Stookey's Wedding Song (correct version ^^) at the wedding of another choir member. They didn't sing it at my wedding - I guess we just got tired of it.

And it was a Catholic wedding, but we purposely didn't sing an "Ave Maria." Why think of virgins at a wedding???

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Skipjack K8
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 04:10 AM

My guess is that you could make Roseville Fair work, 'specially with harmonies. It's got to ge the happiest, most hopeful song about courting and marriage. There's a super MP3 of it done by Wendy Grossman at

http://www.pelicancrossing.net/roseville.htm

I bought the CD from her on the strength of it, and have done it successfully with the band at weddings, but only at receptions, not in church/chapel/registry office.

Good luck

Skipjack

ps You're lucky I looked in here, as I thought it was about that execrable film!

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Hrothgar
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 06:45 AM

Come write me down, ye powers above....etc

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Rich_and_Dee
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 08:36 AM

Hi,

A lot of couples are leaning towards more personalized weddings. With people getting married later, parents tend to be a little less involved and weddings can be a little less stodgy. I would second the suggestion you have a sit-down with the couple and find out what they're in to and what they're expectations are.

At one wedding I attended the couple's first dance was to "Fairytale in New York". The old gang had a great laugh. At another wedding, the joint was jumping when the band played "Secret Agent Man".

The last dance my bride and I danced to was "Will You Go, Lassie, Go".

Good luck!

Rich

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: GUEST,Amy
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 08:39 AM

I went to a Noel Paul Stookey concert a few years ago. He told us that when he wrote the Wedding Song, he wrote it in the first person (more or less divinely inspired, he said):

I am now to be among you,
at the calling of your hearts,
rest assured this troubadour
is acting on my part.

But he feared people would think he had a god complex, so he changed it.

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: GUEST,Pooby
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 11:05 AM

Agreed, the song choice is a very personal thing, but I've always been fond of "Heart to Heart," from Emmylou Harris' "Ballad of Sally Rose" album. A simple, quiet song, with simple yet potent lyrics. I've probably done it at about a half-dozen weddings to date. Pooby

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 01:06 PM

Sally Rogers' song "Lovely Agnes" is pretty good, too, recounting a long, happy marriage starting with courtship & mild parental disapproval, through children, grandchildren and gatherings on the lakeshore with Agnes "now twelve years and four score" surrounded by her family.

Linn

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Emma B
Date: 30 Apr 02 - 04:40 PM

There seem to be far more songs advising against! You could be ironic? and try 'Don't get Married Girls' and many others.Hey, we could start a whole new thread on songs it is not recommended to sing at weddings. I actually went to a folkie wedding where the above was sung ; prophetically - as it turned out!

Subject: RE: Wedding Singer
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 01 May 02 - 04:02 PM

Little Mo

Been there, done that - sang "Sorry the day I was married" after the ("Come write me down") wedding song at my own wedding do. It was meant as a joke at the time...

I was at a wedding last weekend (of Les Sullivan, who wrote "The battle of Jutland") and a guest requested that he sang his song about the Menim Gate at Ypres, so he did. It's a very moving song, but not what you expect at a wedding reception....

Kitty