I’ve been to a lot of weddings this year – four, in fact – and while I could suggest many ways in which I believe they could have been done better, I’m not going to: they were the marriages of friends, and a wedding is after all the happiest day of somebody’s life. The music has got to be changed though. If the couple were too scared to employ a taraf or too determinedly “sophisticated” to hire a DJ, then it’s standard non-threatening fare piped over the restaurant’s sound system:
#1 Eine Klein Nachte Wotsit.
#2 Handel’s Water Music (or is it Vivaldi’s Spring??)
#3 Something by Enya. A classic line from the classic (in my opinion) film School of Rock goes something like: “I’m taking them to a classical concert: you know, Beethoven, Mozart, Enya....”.
#4 The Radedski March: For when the many-tiered cake is wheeled in with it’s fireworks, looking like a confectioner’s mock-up of Flash Gordon’s spaceship.
#5 Something else by J. Strauss, e.g. the famous bit from the Blue Danube - honestly, anybody would think that Romanians wanted the Austro-Hungarian Empire back again....
Enough already. What they should play - but what’s happened to me, why have I become so cynical these days?? - is:
#1 The Beatles’ Your Mother Should Know.... how difficult you’re gonna to be to be married to.
#2 How You Gonna Keep Them Down on the Farm.... after they’ve seen Cluj. There’s no way that the country cousins after having eaten the Vol-au-vents and the bits of cheese wrapped around bits of ham are going share the trough with the pig again.
#3 Sonny and Cher’s (and with apologies to Gyppo in advance, here) Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves.... is what your new in-laws are but we didn’t have the heart to tell you.
#4 In case there’s a bit of awkwardness on the wedding night they’re going to need a sense of humour (though hopefully not quite this much), Frankie Howerd’s version of Je T’Aime.
#5 About two thirds the way through, and a warning to the groom mainly, the Dead Kennedys’ (ahem, and I really must apologise for the indelicacy here, though I am in fact entirely responsible for it) Too Drunk to F**k: your beautiful bride has been refusing you until this night of nights, but the ţuică's really started to flow now and your new brothers-in-law want you in the hora and, well.... it’s your decision :-)
To end, the band they were too scared to book, Taraf de Haïdouks:
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I like the idea you have of Welding Music. To have good songs as you strike the arc or run a bead with the torch is very important. I like to weld to that Hi Ho song from Disney's Snow White.
ReplyDeleteThank god you said they were friends' weddings Gadj, I thought at first you meant they could be improved by having you as the groom. Which seemed a bit risque.
ReplyDeleteI'm troubled by Alice's musical welding, she might start conducting with the filler rod.
Haha, Frankie Howerd! He was a fishwife in a man's body.
ReplyDeleteAlice, another great welding idea. I feel that music to weld by should be something triumphal, like The Final Countdown or perhaps something by The Real Tuesday Weld.
ReplyDeleteInky, oh no no, good heavens no, one was more than enough for me! Don't be troubled by Alice's musical welding - with the general demise of heavy industry it may well be the future (of welding).
Bananas, he was quite a character wasn't he, and I was pleased when Jonathan Ross and others ressurrected his reputation a bit at the end of his career.
I wish people would realise that there are only two important considerations at a wedding: food and booze.
ReplyDeleteAs long as there are fine wines and sweetmeats you can play the Birdie Song.
Well, Meat Loaf's "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" is always good for reminding the bride and groom how they got there in the first place.... Ultimately, Gaw may be right...victuals and spirits, and lots of both.
ReplyDeleteGreat links, by the way!
Gaw, I agree up to a point, as long as very free interpretation is allowed when dancing the Birdy Song!
ReplyDeleteAna, good grief, Meat Loaf's "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" takes me back a bit: it was the favoured tune of a couple of lads I knew I school who had cars and could boast (probably untruthfully) about what they got up to in them!
Boyo, Pop's a legend in his own niche, and though he's never returned my favours when I've commented on his blog, if it's about funerals I might pop over there all the same.
I dread attending weddings, the Hi Ho song would have improved all of them tremendously.
ReplyDeleteHe is a provincial man of mystery, Gadj, what can I say.
ReplyDeleteOne of my friends had "Wish Me Luck As You Wave Me Goodbye!"
ReplyDeleteI'd have to go for REM 'It's the end of the world as we know it'. Cliched. Or just have a ceilidh and avoid any tunes with words, except 'heuch'.
ReplyDeleteLulu, the Hi Ho song indeed brings everything down to a reassuring common denominator.
ReplyDeleteBoyo, and I guess he needs to keep his mystery, or the "Indie" aspect would not work any more.
Kevin, or how about "The End" by The Doors.
Madame, a ceilidh is an excellent idea; in fact as a student of body language I might suggest that words should be banned at weddings altogether!
Qu'importe la musique pourvu que l'on ait l'ivresse !
ReplyDeleteJe comprend d'où vient l'expression " Maître-chanteur" Depuis Charlemagne on a vu succéder aux Bardes un autre genre de Poètes appelés Meistre Langer [sic], c'est-à-dire Maitres-Chantres, ou Phonasques ...
En anglais on pourrais dire "He'll get him to sing like a canary!" mais je ne pense pas que nous ayons une expression tellement intéressant pour celui qui dirige.(Est-ce que je peux en dire "c'est malin, ça" afin d'exprimer que "that's a clever expression")?
Il n'en est pas moins vrai que ...La musique suggère des sentiments. C’est du moins ce qu’affirme Aristote en notant qu’il n’y a pas plus expressif qu’elle !!
La musique adoucit les mœurs , comme la fessée attendrit la viande ,le vin rouge aussi ! :)
That music matters provided that there is drunkenness !
I include where from comes expression "Blackmailer" Since Charlemagne they saw succeeding the Bards another type of Poets called Meistre Langer [sic...], that is to say Maitres-Chantres, or Phonasques...
In English one would be possible say "He'll get him to sing like a canary!" but I do not think that we have an expression so much interesting for the one who runs. (I can say about it "it is clever, this" to express that "that's a clever expression")?
It not some is less true than ...La music suggests feelings. This is less what asserts Aristotle while noting that there is not more expressive than she!! The music softens the morals, as spanking softens meat, the red wine also! :)
Just thought of one:
ReplyDeleteThe Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore.
Monsieur Crabstix, "La music" is indeed a irresistible mistress, and as Claude Lévi-Strauss once remarked "Johnny Halliday est un génie mais j'aime plus Les Chaussettes Noires".
ReplyDeleteBoyo, are we talking weddings or funerals now? I've always thought that thirteen year-old boys at their bar mitzvahs should be required to sing Muddy Waters' "I'm a Man".
Not enough blogs mention the Dead kennedys.
ReplyDeleteAlso, how about Tie Your Mother Down by Queen?
Might be apt.
The Jules, could be a good choice, I never knew they'd recorded a song with that title!
ReplyDeleteYoung Bendigeidfran will enjoy belting out "Werewolf Barmitzvah" come the day:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxk_P3PNuZU&feature=related
La mult ani, by the way!
Boyo, hmm, that would make a good song in a musical version of Jack Rosenthal's excellent play Bar Mitzvah Boy.
ReplyDeleteA great chance to recreate the Universal Pictures car-crash horror films like "Abbot & Costello Meet the Wolfman" - Chief Rabbi Baron Dr Sir Jonathan Sacks Meets The Golem".
ReplyDeleteBoyo: Julia Babette Sarah Neuberger, Baroness Neuberger, DBE and the Beast from 20000 Fathoms.
ReplyDeleteIt's the Beast I feel sorry for.
ReplyDeleteBoyo, you have a point: having lived at 20,000 fathoms for so long he (and I'm assuming it's a "he") would not have the sophisticated rhetorical skills of Dame Julia and would probably end up looking a proper arse.
ReplyDelete