Marching Down the Aisle with Mendelssohn's Wedding March
The Best Moments
Wedding March in C major, Op. 61, No. 9
I'm Felix Mendelssohn, and this is the best moments of my Wedding March. You'll hear the bright trumpet fanfare that opens the march, then the brisk, confident tune that follows it, and it's worth your time because those few moments are what a whole room full of people knows by heart. My fellow composers and I also help you recognize our pieces the moment they begin playing, so come and test yourself on this one and see how quickly it comes to you.
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Trumpets Clear Their Throats
I open the Wedding March with a trumpet fanfare, which is my way of tapping a glass with a spoon and telling a whole room to sit up straight. I wrote it in 1842 for a stage play, so it was never meant for a church, and it still seems to have grown up wanting a very long aisle.
The Quiet Bit Nobody Remembers
In the middle I let the music settle down into a lighter, more flowing stretch, the way a guest leans over to whisper something before the speeches begin. These passages are so easy to forget that churches often skip them altogether, which I try to take as a compliment to the tune on either side.
Everybody Out, Gracefully
By the end I bring the big tune back and build it up until it sounds like the happiest thing in the world, because I wanted the final moments to feel like a proper send-off. It became truly famous after Princess Victoria chose it for her wedding in 1858, and since then it has been walking couples back down the aisle while the guests try to look as though they didn't cry.
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When I wrote this march, I was thinking of a stage and a Shakespeare play, and I never pictured all the aisles it would one day walk down. Since Princess Victoria chose it for her wedding in 1858, it has followed couples out of church doors again and again, and I'm still a little amazed by that. Did you enjoy going through the best moments of Wedding March with me? I hope the fanfare, the quiet middle and the cheerful exit now sound a bit different to you the next time you hear them. There is still a lot more to explore in this piece, and the story doesn't end with the version you know from the church organ. Franz Liszt turned it into a dazzling piano piece in 1849–50, and Vladimir Horowitz later made a showpiece of his own from it. If you'd like to keep going, please click on the links provided and listen to the march again. I think you'll find something new in it each time.