# Wedding March-Wagner's or Mendelssohn's?



## Clouds Weep Snowflakes

When I will get married (if and when), I certainly wouldn't want pop or Oriental music at my wedding! So we have two 19th-century composers that of obvious reasons had complex views of one another (just as Wagner wrote in "Das Judenthum in der Musik"); which wedding music is better in your opinion(s)? I have to admit-I like both!


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## Haydn70

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> When I will get married (if and when), I certainly wouldn't want pop or Oriental music at my wedding! So we have two 19th-century composers that of obvious reasons had complex views of one another (just as Wagner wrote in "Das Judenthum in der Musik"); which wedding music is better in your opinion(s)? I have to admit-I like both!


First, I agree 100% with your choice not to have pop or Oriental music at your wedding. Excellent decision.

As for the Wagner vs. the Mendelssohn, why not both since the Wagner can be used for the entrance of the bride and the Mendelssohn for the recessional just after the completion of the ceremony. For many decades this was the tradition here in the USA.


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes

ArsMusica said:


> First, I agree 100% with your choice not to have pop or Oriental music at your wedding. Excellent decision.
> 
> As for the Wagner vs. the Mendelssohn, why not both since the Wagner can be used for the entrance of the bride and the Mendelssohn for the recessional just after the completion of the ceremony. *For many decades this was the tradition here in the USA*.


Really? I didn't know that! Here in Israel Oriental music has become a standard in weddings, sadly...are things really less dire in Europe or the US? Here it's also illegal to conduct Wagner's Operas in public, though thankfully it's still perfectly legal to sell them for private use...


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## Haydn70

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> Really? I didn't know that! Here in Israel Oriental music has become a standard in weddings, sadly...are things really less dire in Europe or the US? Here it's also illegal to conduct Wagner's Operas in public, though thankfully it's still perfectly legal to sell them for private use...


The bias that exists in Israel against Wagner does not exist here.

There are still many weddings here where the Wagner/Mendelssohn combination is used but it is not anywhere as common as it was. Of the two, however, the Wagner is used more often. It is with the recessional where different pieces tend to be used. I have been to a few weddings where this was the recessional music (including those where I was playing cello in a string quartet):


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes

ArsMusica said:


> The bias that exists in Israel against Wagner does not exist here.
> 
> There are still many weddings here where the Wagner/Mendelssohn combination is used but it is not anywhere as common as it was. Of the two, however, the Wagner is used more often. It is with the recessional where different pieces tend to be used. I have been to a few weddings where this was the recessional music (including those where I was playing cello in a string quartet):


Here it seems that Classical music is mostly for an older audience, but I think in Europe that is not the case, as Classical music is the essence of European music...is that true, or I am misled? What about the US? I'm going to be 29 this summer, does it mean I'm younger than most Classical music fans?


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## Kiki

The Wagner wedding music comes from his opera Lohengrin when the maids prepare for a wedding that's going to go very wrong... Because of that whenever I heard this in a real wedding, I'm afraid I always found it a bit strange.


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## 89Koechel

Good points and questions, CWS. Well, maybe in Israel, it's that class. music is for an older audience, and you can BET (and win, the bet) that class. music has a somewhat OLD (agewise) audience, in America. As for European audiences, I hardly know … and Europe is the birthplace of many, great classical composers, musicians, et. al. … and maybe it's possible that there's a MIX of young and old (audiences) there. Well, you're only 29 (years old), so maybe you're at a GREAT age for enjoying concerts, recordings, etc. and you still might be YOUNGER than those, who still care, deeply, 'bout classical, opera, chamber, etc.


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## MarkW

Wagner's boring and somber. (Oh, God. Is marriage really like this?) Try entering with the Spanish wedding march from The Marriage of Figaro. Then depart to the joyous Mendelssohn.


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## mbhaub

Use what I did: Grieg's Wedding Day at Troldhaugen…


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## Larkenfield

They're both fine. Both are used as the bride walks down the aisle to the altar in a traditional wedding ceremony. Mendelssohn's Wedding March was the original and composed in 1842. His was the first. Wagner's Bridal Chorus came eight years later in 1850 in Lohengrin. Between the two, I consider the Mendelssohn slightly more traditional, cheerful, happier, more celebratory, and sparkling. But happiness can also be heard in Wagner's. I believe that Wagner's was directly or indirectly inspired by Mendelsohn's because he had undoubtedly heard it. Both are fine and full of happiness and the main goal is to attract the ideal bride. If she wants to elope, she probably skip a wedding march.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT

Larkenfield said:


> I believe that Wagner's was directly or indirectly inspired by Mendelsohn's because he had undoubtedly heard it


Also (off-topic), I've always thought that the opening of Tannhäuser Act II ("Dich teure Halle") was inspired by the first movement of Mendelssohn's "Italian" Symphony.


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## Krummhorn

As an experienced church organist for many years, I always try to steer the wedding couple away from the Wagner piece. There are several reasons, the first being it is overly used ... rather boring to play and reminds be of the satirical lyrics that go like "here comes the bride, big fat and wide, here comes the groom, skinny as a broom". I just cannot get those words out of my mind when I am asked to play that piece.

Another reason I dislike it as the piece itself does not promote a lasting marriage, and the union results in a death. A pastor in my former parish actually banned that piece for weddings for that very reason ... it was totally taboo.

There are much better pieces for the entrance processional, Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, Trumpet Tune in D (Clarke), Grand Choer Dialoague (Gibout), even <shrug> Pachelbel's Canon in D is better than the Wagner, imho.

I've heard the Mendelssohn used as both a processional and recessional. I have no qualms about that piece at all.

Kh


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## eugeneonagain

Better to hire a brass quintet to play it. It has more punch and force.






Same people playing Mendelssohn.






Personally I'd go for this. Sounds very fresh and regal:


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## Durendal

Strangely, Mendelssohn's is the more bombastic piece.


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## cyberstudio

Kiki said:


> The Wagner wedding music comes from his opera Lohengrin when the maids prepare for a wedding that's going to go very wrong... Because of that whenever I heard this in a real wedding, I'm afraid I always found it a bit strange.


Amen. When you get to find out Lohengrin's story I am perplexed as to why anyone would use Wagner's wedding march for a wedding. It was part of the reason I wrote a choral piece for my own wedding for my bride's entrance. Same Mendelssohn at the end like everybody else, A Midsummer Night's Dream was a comedy with a happy ending. No problems there whatsoever, except perhaps for the puritan who would have said that the Shakespearean play was all about pagan deities.


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## Larkenfield

Reichstag aus LICHT said:


> Also (off-topic), I've always thought that the opening of Tannhäuser Act II ("Dich teure Halle") was inspired by the first movement of Mendelssohn's "Italian" Symphony.


That's very interesting. I'll have to check that out. Mendelssohn was _first_ and Wagner had to have heard Mendelssohn's music, such as his sparkling Midsummer Nights Dream, or perhaps his Symphonies in order to have a basis in which to ridicule condemn him. There does seem to be a staccato in the strings that sounds similar been the Italian and Tannhauser.


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