Requiem music

Had a very interesting conversation with a Texas friend tonight, and we were talking about the funeral services we had written several years ago (we were both probate attorneys, so this sort of thing is routine as we were trying to set an example for our elderly estate planning clients). He pointed out that I've moved several times since my service was last updated. This is true; I've lived in D.C. for a year and a quarter, and before that I was in Tulsa for three and a half years, and before that....

Anyway, I'm reviewing. The service will be Episcopal 1979 BCP Rite 1. Mass setting will be a congregational-participatory Healey Willan Missa de Sancta Maria Magdalena with soprano descants and sung Our Father. There should be enough incense to obscure the altar. Now, we just have to pick incidental service music. I've come up with some ideas, and I'm looking for outside input.

I. Prelude and postlude

For the prelude, I'm thinking organ transcriptions of Elgar's Variation IX "Nimrod" from Enigma Variations and then Barber's "Adagio" from String Quartet, but I need a third piece to start off the set....perhaps something English or French? I dunno. Suggestions?

For the postlude, I'm thinking Widor's "Toccata" from Symphonie 5 pour Orgue.

Comments? Suggestions? Ideas?

---

II. Service music

Option A: Anglophile

Introit: Thomas Mathews, "Souls of the Righteous"
Sequence: Edgar Bainton, "And I Saw a New Heaven"
Offertory: Ralph Vaughn-Williams, "O How Amiable"
Communion: Herbert Howells, "Like as the Hart Desireth the Waterbrooks"
Committal: John Taverner, "Song for Athene"

Option B: Operatic

Introit: Verdi, "Preghiera di Desdemona" from Otello
Sequence: Bernstein, Movement II ("Adonai roi lo ehsar") from Chichester Psalms
Offertory: Mascagni, "Regina Coeli" from Cavalleria Rusticana
Communion: Wagner, "Pilgrims' Chorus" from Tannhäuser
Committal: Humperdinck, "When at night I go to sleep" and "Pantomime" from Hänsel und Gretel

Option C: Contemporary Christian

Introit: Rick Vale and Sandi Patty, "Doxology"
Sequence: Greg Nelson and Phill McHugh, "People Need the Lord"
Offertory: arr. David Hamilton, "I Know That My Redeemer Liveth" from The Young Messiah
Communion: Marie Barnett, "Breathe"
Committal: Greg Nelson and Phill McHugh, "Come to Me"

Option D: Congregational Hymns Only

Processional: Engelberg, All praise to thee, for thou, O King divine
Sequence: Jerusalem, O day of peace that dimly shines
Gradual: St. Columba, The King of love my shepherd is
Offertory: Thaxted, I vow to thee, my country
Communion: Adoro Devote, Jesus, son of Mary, fount of life alone
Committal: Repton, Dear Lord and Father of mankind
Recessional: Litton, Go forth for God

Comments? Ideas? Suggestions?