Here Comes The Bride Piano Music

Posted by Administrator on 5/20/2012
Here Comes The Bride Piano

The music we’re all familiar with as Here Comes the Bride is actually the “Bridal Chorus” from Richard Wagner’s opera Lohengrin.  Although in some circles, it’s also known as the “Wedding March,” technically that’s not an accurate term for just this piece—many compositions used to accompany a bride’s procession either to the altar or from it can be called this, generically speaking. Also, since there is an actual piece titled “Wedding March” which is part of Felix Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it’s much more accurate to simply refer to this piece as a “bridal chorus.”

An ironic thing about what we’ve always called Here Comes the Bride is that, in the original opera, Lohengrin, it doesn’t accompany the bride down the aisle to her marriage ceremony—but is instead sung after the ceremony is over, by a group of women in the wedding party.  In fact, taking it a step further, brides who know anything about the opera itself might not want to have this piece in their weddings; in the Wagner opera, this singing precedes a marriage that is an utter failure! .

And, despite our frequent association of Here Comes the Bride with weddings, in fact it’s not approved of for many marriage ceremonies. It’s almost never played at Jewish weddings, for example, because of the composer’s well-known anti-Semitism. Many Protestant churches, Lutheran among them, consider its roots “pagan” because of its association with the theater, and therefore frown on its inclusion in a sacred church ceremony. And finally, if you’re marrying in the Catholic Church, it’s widely considered secular and “sentimental” rather than appropriate for worship.
Regardless of whether you’re ever asked to play Here Comes the Bride in a wedding, however, you can enjoy this particular march for a couple of reasons: one, the march is stately and melodic in itself; and two, it’s the best way to “lock in” the sound of the interval of a perfect fourth!

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1 Comments

Jackie
Date: 5/26/2012 9:18:34 AM
This is very timely. I'm getting married soon and I'm looking for songs for my wedding. I'm glad you blogged about this piano music. Will cross this out in my song list.

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