Music we played for the wedding

One of the last tasks I did the last week before the wedding was to burn CDs for all of the guests at the rehearsal dinner and then bundle them in ribbon. There were 7 CDs in all and included every song on the playlists, except for 2. Here's what the cover of the first CD looked like:



And here are the songs we played (each playlist was cut short bc of time, but I needed each playlist too long rather than too short, should the schedule for the day not fit exactly to the plan):

COCKTAIL HOUR:
Frank Sinatra -- Love and Marriage
Harry Connick, Jr. -- All These Things
Dean Martin -- Memories are Made of This
Jane Monheit -- Embraceable You
Louis Armstrong -- Fantastic, That's You
Michael Buble -- Money Can't Buy Me Love
Harry -- Just Kiss Me
Frank -- NY, NY
Ella Fitzgerald -- 'Deed I do
Dean -- You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You
Michael -- Feeling Good
Harry -- A Blessing and a Curse
Jane -- I Won't Dance (or Ella and Louis)
Frank -- I am Loved
Tony Bennett -- I Left My Heart in San Francisco
Louis -- Give Me Your Kisses
Michael --You and I
Ella -- Blue Skies
Frank -- My Kind of Town
Harry -- Something You Got (from Oh, My Nola)
Louis -- Sunshine of Love
Dean -- That's Amore
Ella -- I'm Getting Sentimental Over You
Michael -- The More I See You
Jane -- Taking a Chance on Love
Frank -- You Make Me Feel So Young
Louis -- What a Wonderful World
Jane -- In the Still of the Night
Harry -- Come By Me
Michael -- Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Louis -- Dream a Little Dream
Frank -- I've Got You Under my Skin
Michael -- Fever
Harry -- On the Street Where You Live
Ella -- I'm Just a Lucky So and So
Frank -- -- Night and Day
Jane – Honeysuckle Rose
Michael -- You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine
Harry -- Recipe for Making Love
Ella -- You're my Thrill
Tony -- Just in Time

FIRST BRIDE/GROOM DANCE:
Tavares -- Disco Inferno then
Frank -- I've Got a Crush on You

BRIDGE/FATHER OF THE BRIDE DANCE:
Celtic Folk – Blushing Bride

DINNER:
City of Angels Soundtrack -- City of Angels
Moonlight Sonata
Forrest Gump Suite
Beauty and the Beast Soundtrack -- Be our Guest
Mehndelssohn –- Midsummer Night's Dream
Mozart -- The Marriage of Figaro -- march
Fiddler on the Roof Soundtrack –- Wedding Dance
Glenn Miller -- String of Pearls
Pink Panther Soundtrack -- Theme
Vivaldi –- The Four Seasons
Harry Connick, Jr. -- Muskrat Rumble
Handel –- Music for Royal Fireworks
Mozart –- Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
Pink Panther Sndtrk -- It Had Better Be Tonight (instrumental)
My Fair Lady Soundtrack –- Embassy Waltz
Mozart -- The Marriage of Figaro -- Overture
South Pacific Soundtrack -– Symphonic Scenario for Concert Orchestra
Louie Armstrong -- Basin Street Blues
Harry -- Music, Maestro, Please

PRE-CAKE-CUTTING DANCING:
Corinne Bailey Rae –- Put Yr Records On
Abba -- Dancing Queen
Chicago -- Beginnings
Shania Twain –- From this Moment
Nat and Natalie King Cole -- Unforgettable
Glenn Miller -- In the Mood
B52s –- Love Shack
Earth Wind and Fire -- Got to Get You Into My Life
Chicago – Color My World
Billy Joel -- Just the Way You are
Iz – Over the Rainbow/Wonderful World
Stand By Me -- Great Balls of Fire
Huey Lewis and the News -- The Power of Love
Harry -- Only You
Frank -- The Best is Yet to Come

CAKE CUTTING:
The Beatles -- Birthday
Frank –- What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?
Harry -- I Only Have Eyes For You
James Taylor –- How Sweet it is
Faith Hill –- This Kiss

DANCING:
Grease Soundtrack –- You're the One that I Want
Haiducii -- Numa Numa
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy -- You and me and the Bottle makes 3
Billy Joel -- She's Always a Woman
Edwin McCain –- I'll Be
The Clash -- Rock the Casbah
Bobby McFerrin –- Don’t Worry Be Happy
Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack -- Stayin' Alive
Beatles –- Ob-La-Di
Augustana –- Boston
Neil Diamond –- Sweet Caroline
Fleetwood Mac -- You Make Loving Fun
Chicago –- You're my Inspiration
Frank -- The Way You Look Tonight
Steve Miller Band -- Dance, Dance, Dance
Swingers Soundtrack -- I'm Beginning to See the Light
Ready to Wear Soundtrack -- Here Comes the Hotstepper
Harry -- A Wink and a Smile
Howie Day -- Collide
Footloose Soundtrack -- Footloose
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy -- Go Daddy-O
Prince -- Little Red Corvette
Phenomenon Soundtrack -- Crazy Love
Billy Joel -- She's Got a Way
Abba -- Take a Chance on Me
Earth, Wind, and Fire -- Sing a Song
Forrest Gump Soundtrack – Sugar Pie Honey Bunch
Elton John – Blue Eyes
Harry – Jill
Swingers Soundtrack -- Knock Me a Kiss
Bodyguard Soundtrack -- Queen of the Night
Tower of Power -- (To Say The Least) You're The Most
Beatles -- Something
Billy Joel -- And So It Goes
David Bowie – Let's Dance
Cherry Poppin' Daddies -- Zoot Suit Riot
Devo –- Whip It
REO Speedwagon –- Can't Fight This Feeling
Jim Croce –- Time in a Bottle
Footloose -- Let's Hear It For The Boy
Steve Miller Band -- The Stake
Beatles -- I Want to Hold Your Hand
Stevie Wonder -- You Are the Sunshine of my Life
Harry -- She Belongs to Me
Bodyguard -- Lovely Day
Stevie Wonder -- Signed, Sealed, Delivered
Ready to Wear -- Natural Thing
Sound of Music – Something Good
Billy Joel -- To Make You Feel my Love
Steppenwolf -- Wild Thing
Paul Simon -- Father and Daughter
Chicago -- Color My World
Bryan Adams -- Everything I Do (I Do It For You)
Pajama Game Soundtrack -– There Once Was a Man
Beatles -- She Loves You
Earth, Wind, and Fire -– Reasons

LAST SONGS:
Harry Connick, Jr. -- Save the Last Dance For Me
Michael Buble -- Fly With Me
Harry -- It Had To Be You
Celtic Folk -- Here's to Time
Frank Sinatra -- The Last Dance

All in all, what's listed there is 9 hours of music. Like I said, the hardest part of this task was not accumulating all the possible songs, it was narrowing the list down. There's about 18 more hours of music that I didn't include that we had listed.

Deciding on an "iPod wedding" definitely entailed MUCH more work than if we had hired a DJ or a band or even, as Sara and Brett did, get a jukebox. But for all the work of selecting and ordering the music, it was worth it.

The task that took our entire engagement

I can honestly say that there has been one task that has taken from the day after we were engaged until, probably, a day or two before the wedding; and that task is music.

We've been listening to albums we haven't listened to in years, we've been ripping what we haven't ripped already (the benefit of which being, of course, that almost our entire music library will now be digital and stored on our server), we've been selecting songs for a few different playlists (cocktail hour, dinner, dancing, plus the shorter events like first dance, father/daughter dance, cake-cutting and last dances), we've been scribbling songs from the radio down on whatever teeny piece of scrap paper we could find so we would remember to download them later, we've been organizing and cutting and reorganizing. It's a monumental task, to be quite serious.

I didn't quite figure on this much work, musically speaking, when we decided that our wedding music would be supplied by our MP3 players. If we were engaged for 2 1/2 years instead of slightly over 7 months, I think this task would take 2 1/2 years. At some point (probably 2 days before the wedding), we will have to just finalize whatever we have ended up with at that point.

The hardest part, of course, is not selecting which music to include, but rather selecting which music from our vast list to NOT include. I've had to cut some pretty great songs because of time. The cocktail hour playlist, for example, is all classic love songs -- crooners and modern-day crooners like Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Michael Buble, and, of course, Harry Connick, Jr. We have easily 10 hours of wonderful music that I'd love to be able to play, but cocktail hour is only 2 hours long. Narrowing it down is hard. I have to keep telling myself that it's background music -- everyone will be talking. And just because we don't play it at the wedding doesn't meant we don't ever play it. But the choices are getting more difficult.

Wish me luck!