Music for my funeral, I'm forward planning!

I want The Pogues' version of 'Worms' for one of my pieces.

Many, many, thanks for all your suggestions. I will listen to each and everyone then choose.

I see no-one's mentioned Highway to Hell yet.

My friend had Arthur Brown's 'Fire' as the final piece of music and didn't go through the curtains until the bit at the end where he sings 'You're gonna burn, you;re gonna burn'. It didn't go down well.

Me, I'm thinking in terms of Calon Lan, by a proper Welsh male voice choir, the original of Daydream Believer and, well, I'm open to sensible suggestions.

My wife is a funeral celebrant.
She often has some quite whacky choices for music.
As well as the tediously unoriginal My Way, which will cause funeral directors etc to groan at having to hear it yet again!

That sounds very upsetting Hetty58. I think it needs a degree of sensitivity in choosing amusing lyrics.

Songs that have wonderful meaningful words that are uplifting rather than sad:
I Can See Clearly Now - Johnny Nash.
Going Back - Dusty Springfield
In My Life - The Beatles

(My ex chose 'Goodbye-ee! Goodbye-ee wipe a tear, baby dear, from your eye-ee' for his estranged wife's funeral. Even I thought that was a bit much. He seemed to think it would 'cheer up' the family - he thought wrong!)

Mozart's Lacrimosa requiem.

I really hate funerals - so I'm not having one. Perhaps, though, it's best to recognise that it's never 'my' funeral, just a ritual for the relatives, who might like to choose the music?

Great thread with plenty of ideas.
I’m aiming for a humanist short memorial service, not keen on crems.
As I won’t be there to participate will leave it to any family/friends who want to organise, but possibly leave a few suggestions for them.

Pentangles Lyke Wake Dirge. I’ve often planned my funeral music. And See Emily Play. Maybe Levellers One Way as well.

Will the real slim shady please stand up was played as we left after my girl's funeral.

Ave Maria, I like both the Schubert and the Gounod arrangements.
My husband had Mozart’s Et Incarnatus Est and Soave Il Vento from Cosi fan tutte and yes, I can’t listen to those now…

Time to say goodbye, guaranteed to have everyone in tears

For my late mother’s funeral, we chose 4 pieces of music -

Bach Prelude No 1 in C Major (piano version) - this was for going into church where the funeral service took place.

Moonlight Serenade by Glen Miller - this was as we were about to leave church after the service. A favourite of my mum’s!

Clair de Lune by Debussy - as we entered the crematorium for a brief committal service

Requiem Pardism by Gabriel Faure (version by Cantorum of Oxford)

All lovely, poignant and wistful pieces of music. We chose the classical pieces by googling “Funeral Music” and then listening to various pieces on YouTube. The funeral directors were very good in finding the exact music and versions that we’d chosen.

My mum chose her own hymns about 10 years before she died, but my sister and I chose the other music (as mentioned above) for the service at the church and the crematorium.

Hope this helps.

I just want the service to be as short as possible so as to avoid inflicting unnecessary suffering on my family. A short but sweet CofE service. I don't see this as my last hurrah with all my favourite pieces of music/songs. I see it as a very sad occasion for my family, which I don't want to be unnecessarily prolonged. Just me trying to be a selfless Mum. What counts for me is that the service will be in a church that I know well and that I will then be buried in its lovely country churchyard amongst family and friends.

Nimrod by Elgar, played by the Grimethorpe Colliery Band - shivers down my spine.

Rachmaninov -Vocalise, so beautiful.

Time In A Bottle by Jim Croce

I chose May It Be by Enya for my Dad’s funeral. It was beautiful.

Depends if you want traditional or are open to anything. I had If Heaven by Andy Griggs played to begin my husband's funeral. (It's also sung by its writer Gretchen Peters, who's also got a great voice.) I'll put a YouTube link in so you can hear it, but here are the lyrics. (I copied & pasted so please don't blame me for the punctuation errors!)

Lyrics
If heaven was an hour, it would be twilight
When the fireflies start their dancin on the lawn
And suppers on the stove, and mammas laughin
And everybodys workin day is done
If heaven was a town it would be my town
On a summer day in 1985
And everything i wanted was out there waitin
And everyone i loved was still alive
don't cry a tear for me now baby
There comes a time we all must say goodbye
And if that's what heavens made of
You know what I ain't afraid to die
If heaven was a pie it would be cherry
Cool and sweet and heavy on the top
And just one bite would satisfy your hunger
Thered always be enough for everyone
If heaven was a train it sure would be a fast one
To take this weary travler round the bend
And if heaven was a tear it'd be my last one
And you'd be in my arms again
don't cry a tear for me now baby
There comes a time we all must say goodbye
And if that's what heavens made of
You know what I ain't afraid to die.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpIdRkfVtA8

My late FiL was a particularly horrible man who took a delight in making everyone around him, especially his family, miserable for all of his 91 years.
He went into the Crematorium to the tones of 'Road to Nowhere' by Talking Heads.

Shinamae

I’m having a simple cremation so there will be no service and no music BUT if I were to have a funeral song it would be “wish me luck as you wave me goodbye”…?

My exes nan had that are her funeral, and it was exactly the right song choice, I think.

It makes me smile when I think of her; she was a lovely woman.

Germanshepherdsmum

I would worry that in having a favourite song played I would spoil that song for my family as hearing it would always take them back to my funeral.

On the contrary, I would hope that the songs would always remind them of me...
On a similar note though, one of my all-time favourite songs, Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls, was chosen for their first dance by my son and his wife at their wedding. They have since split up under fairly harrowing circumstances, but I still love the song in its own right and play it regularly - it doesn't remind me of that day.

Revd Richard Coles talks in one of his books about Don’t Leave Me This Way being played at a funeral he was conducting. It was played as the coffin was being carried out of the church.
(For those who don’t know, he was in the Communards, a 1980s band and this was one of their most popular songs)

I would worry that in having a favourite song played I would spoil that song for my family as hearing it would always take them back to my funeral.