My thanks to Gail Rubin, author of The Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning For Those Who Don’t Plan to Die, and the Family Plot blog for bringing to my attention Before Their Time, an inspirational organisation in the USA.

Before Their Time is a musical resource, a series of CDs, dedicated to the memory of people who died young to help loved ones recover from the emotional trauma and extended grief that follows a premature death.

The variety of music included in Before Their Time appeals to a broad audience, and although people will be familiar with some of the songs and performers, many will be new to most listeners. Executive Producer Michael Whitman hopes that listeners will discover a universality in the songs’ messages, and that these memorial songs, about the spirit of life as well as the poignancy of loss, will be remembered for their beauty even more than for the grief they express.

Besides offering musical comfort, this project raises money and visibility for organisations helping individuals and families going through end-of-life experiences with revenue from sales going to hospice and suicide prevention programmes in the US.

We wish it well, and hope that visitors to My Last Song and readers of this blog purchase some or all of these powerful, moving and beautiful pieces of music.

I was very encouraged to read this excellent blog by Gail Ruben.

Gail runs A Good Goodbye out of Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Its strapline, which appeals hugely to the My Last Song team, is ‘Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die’. We have two straplines which benefit from greater brevity but lack the clever humour. They are: ‘Plan Your Exit Strategy’ and ‘A Good Life Deserves A Good Ending’.

Gail’s blog looked at what she loosely titles funeral films, and then describes the great music played in the soundtracks.  Quite a few have been chosen by visitors to Family Bhive in their fave five – the five songs they want to be remembered by, or played at their funeral, or send off party. Several haven’t yet been chosen but should be listened to because they are  excellent farewell songs.

What was encouraging was the confirmation that there is  a growing interest in the importance of getting the right music played at your farewell, rather than clichéd hymns (and I recognise how important hymns are for those of the Christian faith) and even clichéd secular songs.

My Way comes top of those songs that show little imagination. There are better Frank Sinatra tracks, even though Paul Anka’s lyrics are very apt for the final review of a life about to end.

In the past few months there have been increasing number of online forums, mainly in the US, Canada and UK, discussing funeral songs. The range of suggestions has been vast, covering most modern music genres, as well as arias and classical pieces.

Anything which makes people think about their mortality and plan to make it as positive and successful a goodbye as possible should be encouraged. That’s why we are part of the Dying Matters coalition here in the UK and want to share information and ideas with people like Gail Ruben in the US.

A few months ago, during a dreary long November evening, I turned to the solace of music, in particular the music of Neil Diamond.

After listening to some of my favourite numbers, I realised just how appropriate many of his songs were to mark the end of someone’s life. So I spent most of the night playing his songs, listing them, re-ordering them, adding to and amending my choices and when finalised, writing cameo descriptions of their unique appeal and qualities as farewell songs.

The next morning, hardly a word had to be changed when I added the article to My Last Song – called simply Farewell Songs From Neil Diamond.

Now, four months later, I have played every track in the list, and I want you to enjoy the beauty and power of some of these songs. Self indulgent, yes, but please share this indulgence with me by listening to the following by clicking the YouTube clips in the article.

Stones
A haunting, poetic song of recalled love and yearning made more beautiful by the sumptuous arrangement.  Stones marked Diamond’s arrival as a writer of original, complex and exceptionally moving songs, using metaphor and imagery with a confidence that would make him one of the outstanding artists of his generation.

If You Go Away
Originally by Jacques Brel, this is one of the most endearing love songs ever written. Diamond clearly recognised its emotional power and delivers an unforgettably touching, sensitive version.

Play Me
In the most lovely, sensitive couplets Diamond reveals to his lover the extent to which he depends on her for his very existence. ‘You are the sun, I am the moon, You are the words, I am the tune…Play me.’ And if ever a melody was written that matched a song’s sentiments, Diamond achieves it here.

Dear Father
Diamond wrote the score for the film Jonathan Livingstone Seagull including this heart rending tour de force. Symphonic in structure, much of it is instrumental and epic in its aural power and pastoral beauty. ‘Dear Father, we dream while we may,’ is the description of so many lives unfulfilled but no less special.

I’ve Been This Way Before
A particularly appropriate farewell song with Diamond extracting every last drop of emotion. In adding layer upon layer of sound, power and sentiment, Diamond proves he’s the master of poignant sadness. It articulates intense grief, yet also can be read as promising hope and release.

Dry Your Eyes
You get the feeling that Diamond is seeing the crowded church swaying to the swirling rhythms, tears swelling in every eye, the haunting French horns used to scintillating effect as the song comes to an end. ‘And if you can’t recall the reason, can you hear the people sing? Right through the lightening and the thunder to the dark side of the moon, To that distant falling angel that descended much too soon. And come dry your eyes.’ Dry Your Eyes is an almost shameless manipulation of our raw emotions.

Be
Poetry of the highest order, ‘Be as a page that aches for a word, Which speaks on a theme that is timeless, While the one God will make for your day. Sing as a song in search of a voice that is silent, And the one God will make for your way.’ The magnificent arrangement builds into an intense climax, before a gentle closing. The closest Diamond has come to writing a hymn.

Hello Again
Diamond here expresses the grief of parting from a loved one…it hurts so much nothing can disguise it. Unbearable sadness, perfectly expressed.

I Am I Said
Poetic, enigmatic, intense, and emotional with a brilliant arrangement and memorable melody. I Am I Said excites and disturbs in equal measure. His dramatic delivery ensures we share his vulnerability.
Well, if you have got this far, and if you have played some of these tracks I thank you and hope you share my enthusiasm for and love of Neil Diamond’s songs.

As you can gather, they mean a huge amount to me. And, in the right setting, they might mean a lot to others as well.

Among the favourite five farewell songs sent in by a visitor to My Last Song was the Tom Waits version of Somewhere, from West Side Story.

It made me think of just how suitable some of the numbers from the great musicals would be as funeral songs, so I asked a friend of mine who is a lover of musicals to come up with a list, and what great songs she selected.

I encourage those who are interested in the My Last Song mission of ensuring the right music is played at the end to go through the list. There are 23 in all and while there’s not enough space in this blog to comment on all of them, I want to describe what might be called the show stoppers.

And if you think I’ve not highlighted the right songs, or that there are some great musical tracks missing, please let me know.

Third on the list after Somewhere and the rightly popular You’ll Never Walk Alone is the less well known but equally appropriate If Ever I Would Leave You, from Camelot.  This is a beautiful song, with a lovely, haunting melody and the most poignant of lyrics. Lancelot is saying that it is inconceiveable that he would ever leave Guenevere.  And suitable for a farewell because the message is that love goes on forever.

Contrast this with the next track, The Party’s Over, from Bells Are Ringing. This describes the wistful, almost cold,  acceptance that the affair is over, “it’s time to call it a day.”  While it lasted it was fun, but in the cold light of morning, “the candles flicker and dim.” A more realistic though less positive view of life after a loved one has passed.

Similarly bleak is Who Can I Turn To, which featured in Roar of the Greasepaint, Smell of the Crowd. This is about the stark fear of  impending loneliness: ‘With no star to guide me and no one beside me, I’ll go my way and after the day, the darkness will hide me…maybe tomorrow I’ll find what I’m after…’  Many will understand the pathos of that lyric.

Another poignantly sad love song featured in the list is This Nearly Was Mine, a Rogers and Hammerstein classic from South Pacific. The lyric tells of the idealistic love Emile thought he would share with Nellie, but snatched away because she could not accept he had fathered children by a Pacific Islander. The melody is mesmerisingly beautiful, and the combination makes the hairs stand on end. I can see this becoming a popular and affecting farewell song.

Another standout from the list is I Have Dreamed, from the King and I. A similarly powerful combination of sentimental lyric and memorable melody, the interest here is the ambiguity. Did the love which in this song is dreamt about, ever really exist?  In the future, will the love only be in dreams because a loved one has parted?

Less ambiguous are Thank You For The Music, from Mama Mia, It’s Raining In My Heart, from Buddy and Noone But You (Only The Good Die Young) from We Will Rock You. But for fans of Abba, Buddy Holly and Queen these songs have a special message, and that’s the point.

The Lloyd Weber numbers, Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again, Think of Me and No Matter What all have suitable lyrics for the final call, and the first two have powerful melodies and arrangements that will stir the emotions.  No Matter What wouldn’t have been my choice, but I can see why others might choose it.

Anyway, have a listen, and bear these wonderful tracks in mind when choosing last songs, advising on last songs, or just wanting to listen to some of the finest numbers that have graced the stage and screen.

When the final curtain closes, they may well be show stoppers. They will certainly be tear jerkers.

Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart has issued guidelines about how Catholic funerals should be conducted. He states that pastors should avoid allowing the funeral to become a celebration of the deceased person’s life.

“Secular items such as romantic ballads, pop or rock music, political songs, football club songs are never to be sung or played at a Catholic funeral,” says his guidelines.

You can’t help but wonder if he woke up in a bad mood that day, as he continues: ”A Catholic funeral is not ‘a celebration of the life of Mary Brown’ or ‘a memorial service for Mary Brown’. These designations should never appear in media announcements or on the booklet.”

Hopefully such guidelines won’t be repeated here, because as the My Last Song poll on funeral music indicates, secular music is far more popular than hymns.

The baby boomer generation that 50 years ago redefined the youth culture is now redefining how society looks at death and dying.

They don’t want the ‘cut and paste’ anonymity of traditional funerals which is why secular music at funeral ceremonies is now so popular.

My Last Song describes funerals which mix religious and secular elements as the Modern British Funeral.

The Modern British Funeral is more celebratory than grieving as family and friends give tributes to the loved one rather than listening to readings delivered by the minister.

Other features of the Modern British Funeral include informal dress codes, colourful eco-friendly coffins, greater accessibility to mourners of other faiths and interment in Woodland burial sites.

The Modern British Funeral recognises the growing secularisation and diversity of our society, and concerns about our environment., which is why families increasingly request that money is donated to good causes rather than spent on funeral flowers.

I’ve no doubt that similar ‘modern’ funerals are common in Australia, and realise that Archbishop Hart was giving guidelines for funerals of practicing Catholics in his diocese.

Should, however, Archbishops here consider following his example, they would do well to consider that a mix of secular and religious is a pretty good compromise, at a time when compromise is important for friends and family of a departed loved one.

Less than one in five people who voted in a poll on funeral music choices on My Last Song chose hymns to be played at their funerals.

The poll, carried out between 14 June and 16 August, asked people to vote on the type of music they wanted played at their funeral.

Thirty nine percent of the 150 voters chose modern secular while those who wanted a mixture of all categories accounted for 27 per cent. The full results are given later.

The poor showing of hymns confirms the trend towards funerals with a greater secular content.

My Last Song describes funerals which mix religious and secular elements as the Modern British Funeral.

It is more celebratory than grieving as family and friends give tributes to the loved one rather than listening to readings delivered by the minister.

Other features of the Modern British Funeral include informal dress codes, colourful eco-friendly coffins, greater accessibility to mourners of other faiths and interment in Woodland burial sites.

Modern British Funerals also include civil ceremonies held at local council buildings or other suitable non-religious locations. Civil celebrants are trained to officiate at funerals which mix secular and religious elements.

Once people face their own mortality, the more likely they are to want a Modern British Funeral. If they leave it to others, it is more likely they will have a traditional funeral that doesn’t reflect their views or lifestyle.

The choices, and number of votes, were:

Hymns: 27;

Modern secular (popular music from about the 1920s onwards): 59;

Classical secular (non-religious classical music): 11;

Classical religious (songs from requiems, Ave Maria, sacred classical music): 6;

A mix of these: 40;

Something else (poetry and non-musical readings): 7.

Visitors to My Last Song contribute their favourite five farewell songs. So far 48 people have contributed their five farewell songs. Only two people have asked for a hymn.

The most popular farewell songs that visitors have so far contributed are:

What A Wonderful World: Louis Armstrong

Heartbeats: José González

Here Comes the Sun: The Beatles

I Say A Little Prayer: Aretha Franklin

How Can You Mend A Broken Heart: Al Green

Je ne regrette rien: Edith Piaf

My Funny Valentine: Sarah Vaughan

Start Me Up: The Rolling Stones

I’m just not sure about hymns. By that I mean I have launched a website called My Last Song which encourages people to plan the funeral that best matches their beliefs, values and the individual lives they all, we all, lead.

The idea for the website came when I attended two funerals of contemporaries who were music lovers and yet their funerals where what I call  ’cut and paste’ …same hymns, same eulogies, same ritual as everyone else, just the names changed.

But my friends were not ‘everyone else’, and at the very least the music played at their farewells could have reflected their musical tastes and talents.

Like the majority of the UK population, my friends didn’t go to church and had no religious views.  Their funerals nevertheless featured hymns.

People inside the church knew the hymns and there was something cathartic about the mourners – family and friends of very different ages and backgrounds still shocked and grieving – singing together. We were unified in creating a shared emotion, each recognising it was part of a traditional, if anachronistic, way of saying goodbye.

At both wakes, people commented upon the paradox that they enjoyed singing the hymns while accepting they didn’t have any significance to the lives of our friends we were remembering.

Would secular, contemporary songs have had the same affect?

I have also attended humanist funerals when the contemporary secular songs selected gave very specific messages to some, but not all, of the assembled mourners.

The affect on this group was profound – some smiled, some nodded knowingly, some broke down, and most joined in the lyrics.

Others at these funerals, however, were rather left out,  didn’t get ‘the message’ and must have felt less able to say goodbye properly.

Even so, on balance, I believe that choosing hymns because they are an ‘easy option’ and that all age groups and backgrounds will join in (less and less the case in our diverse society where an increasing number of  people will have close friends of different faiths or none) is a less satisfactory choice than selecting music and readings that are true to our beliefs and lifestyles.

At My Last Song we are interested in what others think and have a poll on the type of music you want played at your funeral on our home page.

Please take part.

Several months ago I wrote some lyrics…the song title was My Last Song I Sing For You. The purpose was to record a song that would increase awareness of My Last Song.

I asked my friend singer/songwriter Leonie Casanova to write the melody which she and her collaborator Richard Bignell delivered to me a few weeks later. All I needed now was a vocalist as Leonie’s contract prevented her from recording it.

At this point, my friend Marlene Forde, who runs a small south London charity that gives voice coaching to disadvantaged teenagers, introduced me to Raphael, known to his friends as Raph.

He was an articulate, charming, polite and enthusiastic young man. It mattered not a jot to him nor to me that he walked with the aid of crutches, a result of contracting polio when he was a baby in Nigeria.

More important was the quality of his voice. The impromptu audition was a revelation…an ex-choir boy, he sang the last verse of How Great Thou Art without any false starts or any hint of embarrassment. His warm, strong tenor ended confidently on the high note, his eyes looking into the middle distance.

In the next few months, I organised the recording of My Last Song I Sing For You with Raph as the vocalist.  I hired session musicians and backing singers, one of whom, Mabel, is Jools Holland’s daughter.  Richard Bignell put the various tracks together at his Acton recording studio, and the result is a great song for which I take little credit, now available to download on iTunes.

During this process, I was in Raph’s  company for many hours.  He never swore; didn’t use ‘like’ or ‘kind of’ when speaking. His sentences were well formed and delivered with just a hint of a south London accent.

I found out that he joined the South East London Army Cadet Force when 12 finishing as Company Sergeant Major, marching at the head of the cadets on crutches.

He had successfully completed the outward bound stage of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Gold Medal award which included a four day expedition on foot (and crutches) over Dartmoor National Park.

He attended Archbishop Tenison’s School in Vauxhall where he was Head Boy and Captain of the School.

For three years he helped to organise Tate Forum events for young people including Loud Tate, an art/musical performance day at Tate Britain.

He had just left school with three A’ Levels and was enjoying the first year of his degree course reading Astro Physics at Lancaster University.

During his Easter vacation he came back to London and we filmed the video that is now on YouTube.  An easier person to work with would be impossible to find. He won over the crew without trying.

In some ways Raph’s an exceptional person.  In others, he’s a typical product of Nigerian, and more generally African, parenting skills and attitude. His mother and father instilled in him the value of education, good manners, perseverance and regular church going. It was certain that Raph would be a choir boy and equally certain he would become head choir boy.

Raph hasn’t asked for any special treatment or favours because of his disability. He has just been determined to succeed in every thing he as put his mind to.

That is why he spent hours rehearsing the song before going into the recording studio and why he insisted that several scenes in the video were re-shot until he was happy with his performance.

Thank you Raph.