Music for a tricky funeral

[Lottapianos]

Planning MIL's funeral service. DP and I had a difficult relationship with her and we don't know much about her musical tastes. Would like some suggestions for tasteful, sober, respectful pieces of instrumental or sung music with the following caveats:

Nothing religious or spiritual
Nothing about love
Nothing mushy about 'family'
Nothing about what an inspiration the person was ('You Raise Me Up' etc)

For extra context, she was 76 and VERY conservative/ stuck in the past. Thanks for any suggestions, it's a tough one!

But @LyingWitchInTheWardrobe , OP is clearly in a distressing, stressful situation. No matter what the relationship was with someone who died, there are strong emotions involved. They may not be simple ones of loss and grief, but of pain and abandonment, grief for what should have been, anger and betrayal.

The absence of sadness and sentimentality about a death isn't the same as the absence of emotion.

All this needs to be dealt with at the same time as all the practical elements that come with someone's death. It's an awful, overwhelming situation in the best of times, and not one to criticise someone for navigating as best they can.

You'll need 3 pieces of music.
"Entry" - something slow & solemn.
"Middle" - for quiet contemplation.
"Exit" - something bright & uplifting as mourners leave.

I missed where the op said she detested her mil

only that they had a difficult rel and there was a back story

Ashokan farewell (Instrumental version)- heard it at a friends fathers funeral. They struggled as he was quite anti-Religion and it is a beautiful peace of music.

A close family member has asked for . at their funeral...

Great minds think alike- different versions of the same music!

Something from her era? DH's grandad had In The Mood by the Glenn miller band which was quite uplifting and Moonlight Serenade which was a bit calmer. He didn't really like music but it seemed to fit quite well.

Think classical is the way to go , OP - some beautiful suggestions upthread.
Love the “Ashokan Farewell “, which I wasn’t familiar with .
In similar circumstances, we chose Gabriel’s Oboe by Ennio Morricone from the film “The Mission”.
Just over 3 minutes long and worked perfectly for the quiet contemplation part of the service.

Benny Hill theme?

Actually, the best way to avoid this is to treat the people in your life well. That way the people organising your funeral will feel very differently about you.

Please have some empathy for the OP. She is organising a funeral for someone with whom she had a difficult relationship. There’s a back story. If you don’t have any useful advice about music, please leave her alone.

We had that at my mil's funeral. It's lovely and would work well in your situation op. Personally I would go classical for all your choices. It's not going to offend anyone. Nimrod is another good one.

@LyingWitchInTheWardrobe but she's asked for song recommendations and nothing else. It's not up to us to pry.

Also my mil was a very difficult person with a diagnosed mental health condition for at least half of her long life. I know what it's like op. 💐

Note - I am not saying that all people with bad mental health are difficult. I know they aren't but in my mil's case it was that, combined with a tricky personality.

hyperbole

Mull of Kintyre. Or Farewell to Stromness

@LyingWitchInTheWardrobe Those specifications seem fine to me. If it’s not a religious funeral and MIL was not religious, it’s obviously right to discount religious music.

As for the rest, I think it would if anything be more disrespectful to have music which in no way reflects the relationship- the idea of playing “There’s no one quite like grandma” or whatever in this context is ghastly.

Plus a lot of people simply don’t like mushy stuff. I have a great relationship with my mum but wouldn’t dream of having sentimental syrupy music or “inspirational” stuff at her funeral when she dies as I know that she would absolutely hate it.

I think you’re perhaps misreading the situation or projecting some of your own stuff.

I'm not the slightest bit interested in the reasons why OP feels the way she does. That's her right. It's mine to shudder at the disrespect and on that point I'm going to leave it now. I don't respond to @-ing btw, it's just annoying.

Anything written for cello!

Faure's Elegy

Saint Saen's The Swan

Any of the Sarabande's from Bach's Suites for Cello (1-6) No. 1 is beautiful:

Clair de Lune - Debussy. Well known, peaceful and fairly short.
In fact lots of Debussy would be suitable.
Pavane Pour Une Infante Défunte - Ravel. Might be a bit long but a beautiful and appropriate piece.
I'm not quite sure why you are getting such a hard time from some posters OP. You've asked for suggestions that are respectful and sober but not sentimental which sounds entirely appropriate to me. You're hardly saying you want your late MIL's funeral to be terrible. You could easily just leave everything to the funeral director, not have any music at all or pick something you like regardless of your late MIL's tastes and views but it sounds to me that you are going to some effort to choose something that she at least wouldn't disapprove of. If she wasn't religious and there wasn't a close family relationship then it's perfectly ok for the funeral to reflect that. A peaceful classical piece would be ideal. Just don't pick something you really love or it will be forever associated in your mind.

on that point I'm going to leave it now.

This would be for the best.

Definitely a classical piece - no lyrics for people to try and decipher the message in.

Barber' adagio has already been mentioned, I think this would be perfect.

A couple of people on here obviously lack the imagination to realise that some family relationships are beyond difficult and may even be abusive. The op and her family are asking for suitable music that isn't hypocritical. Good for them.

It sounds like the funeral will be completely respectful, just lacking in the overflow of love and sentiment that a genuinely close, loving relationship calls for.

Do those critisising the op think that all funerals should pretend that everyone is a lovely, kind and well loved person? Genuinely would love to know the answer to that.

for a family member we played

1st movement beethoven moonshine sonata
the 'largo' movement of dvorak's new world symphonie

nice melodies, familiar to most. not religious.

might possibly add mendelsson's hebrides (fingal's cave)

There will be people at the funeral who did like the deceased MIL