Thanks davido. I had to look up what Arimathean was!

The issue is, at least in part, is that often the funerals are full of non-practicing and/or non-Catholics who know none of the music. So I don't know if I could rely on them singing from the pews.

@trentonjconn Are you EF or OF? I wonder if that makes a difference?

It’s ubiquitous because funerals are during the work day, and usually on short notice. Also few people can shell out the money for a paid choir and most don’t know or value choral music enough to spend on it.

Yes, parochial school choirs did sing for funerals. It was simple music.

A volunteer choir consisting of adult choir members and as necessary a few recruits is always an option presented to families in our parish. We usually sing two or three hymns and a very short motet. This tradition in the parish goes back sixty or seventy years. It works very well, in my opinion.

We sing the propers and the Ordinary in Latin. Nothing else. Some love it. Some hate it. I do not care. Its what we do.

I started a funeral choir about 8 years ago because I was sick of having just organ and cantor. I'm fortunate to have a number of GOOD singers who are past either retirement-age or who work flexible hours!

Yeah, it's the need to have flexible work schedules or be retired where I'm getting stuck, because it's a real motley crew. Some can sing, and hardly any read music. They don't practice - they just show up (I never know how many will come). It verges on embarrassing if the family of the deceased isn't well-known to the parish (which is often the case - an OF parish and the children are usually non-practicing).

For motets we pull from the following simple repertoire:
Requiem aeternam (Martini)
Lux aeterna (Casciolini)
In paradisum (Bernard Sexton)
Ave Maria (Schubert)
Nunc dimittis (Dyson)
Panis angelicus (Franck)
Justorum animae (Mead)
Lead Kindly Light (Purday)
O Rest in the Lord (Mendelssohn)
Pie Jesu (Faure)

I could only dream of having a list like that! Everyone wants "On Eagle's Wings" and "Here I am, Lord".

The plan is that they have the list of recommended songs, and I'm going to send them practice tracks to have on hand. When a funeral comes up they'll get the list of songs chosen, they come if they can make it, and they will have learned the parts on their own at home. Now of course there's a lull in funerals so we have yet to test it, but we'll see how it goes.

Please report back and let us know how that works!

I’ve heard tales of parochial school choirs singing for funerals in the olden days. I’m guessing it was mostly psalm toned propers and their two best unison motets.
Educational standards were different back then. Can’t imagine getting a whole choir excused regularly for funerals these days.

Yeah, we pull kids from class to altar serve, but there's no liturgical choir at our school, unfortunately. That would simplify things for me if there were!

We have a list of approved hymns from which the families can choose 2, then they ca write down any alternate requests if they like. Sometimes there's space for other hymns, sometimes not... ;^)

Out of curiosity, what hymns do you commonly have (or have not) time for?

@abbysmum - My Grade 3-4 schola (24 kids) sang for two funerals this school year (by request of the families, who heard them sing for Mass on All Saints Day). I will be using students for future funerals (we don't have them too often). If the middle school boys can skip class to altar serve (and get paid for it) I see no reason why students can't sing. Thankfully, the teachers, principal, and pastor all agree.

for us it's more a matter of do we have the right voices present... but we would have time for "O Jesu Christe" (Jacquet)

Funerals are announced and then they’re usually chanted unless we get a note otherwise (but they’re supposed to be sung Masses except in grave/exceptional circumstances…) so we scrounge some people together once we know the date and time. Depending on how things go, if the burial is at the local (Catholic) cemetery, I will push to also sing the rite at the grave. Reciting it is a bit lame if we have the people.

The rite in the Rituale Romanum is meant to be sung as a procession. It is normally merely recited at the grave but between myself and anyone willing to come it can be sung. If the burial is delayed the chants are never omitted. You sing them before loading the body in the hearse after one last aspersion.

The new gradual also has chants to sing at the grave although I couldn’t tell you what they are off of the top of my head.

If it’s during a weekday workday, I don’t charge a penny for my services to play a funeral at my own parish. I encourage people to use that savings and hire my singers. Most do.

I put out an Email to my staff singers and a few friends around town indicating the desired forces, and those available reply. First come, first served.

I have a pretty thorough planning document that operates on the principle that funeral Masses are also parish liturgies, and that, questions of fittingness aside, this helps make sure everything goes smoothly, since the flow for all those involved in making the liturgy happen is what we are used to. If necessary, I explained that lead time on these things is pretty short, that what we do is extremely beautiful, and that this really is the best way to make sure that their loved one has a beautiful, prayerful, dignified funeral.

Usually, articulated that way, I have a good response, even from people who opened with requests we can’t accommodate.

Also, once you articulate to people that we are happy to have them involved in the process if that is meaningful to them, but that they do not need to worry about cleaning their loved ones funeral… that, if they literally never called back, their loved one would have a beautiful and dignified funeral, because that’s what we do, it takes so much pressure off of people in very difficult situations, and they are usually super grateful to hear it.

They usually stay involved, which is good (my goal is not actually to get them to stop being involved, because I find a certain amount of input helps me know that I’m on the right track in helping this family to grieve), but it changes the whole tenor from a mourning relative stressfully trying to plan an entire funeral from the ground up without knowing the rules or ins and outs, to calmly indicating the two or three things that are truly deeply meaningful to them.

But, that being said, within those parameters, we try to be as accommodating as possible. For example, had a very tragic TLM funeral for a young girl come up. Family really wanted a violinist from the parish to play — not kosher during the Requiem Mass itself, of course. So you’d better believe we had her play a prelude right up to start time.

We also haven’t had a person die in the parish in 5 years (the people who died moved away in their final years)

Wow! That's surprising and the opposite of what we see so often these days - the number of funerals far exceeds the number of weddings, by something like 7 funerals to 1 wedding. How many weddings to do you guys do a year?

But, that being said, within those parameters, we try to be as accommodating as possible.

This is my philosophy too. I always try to say yes unless there's a reason I have to say no.

If it’s during a weekday workday, I don’t charge a penny for my services to play a funeral at my own parish. I encourage people to use that savings and hire my singers. Most do.

:-) how very kind of you!