I recently planned the most beautiful faerie-tale castle wedding. Part of what made it such an immersive, whimsical experience was the music. To truly capture a theme, the senses must all be engaged to the extent possible, so I really wanted the music to have a careful touch and spent hours upon hours curating my playlists.
Below, I will discuss the main parts of the wedding that call for a soundtrack and share the playlists I made to drive home that faerie tale theme.
(Note: This post contains affiliate links to items that you can purchase from Amazon. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. Thank you.)
Prelude
As people are entering the venue, finding their seats, greeting friends and family, and quietly waiting for the ceremony, play something to set the tone. This will be the first music they hear, so you’ll really want something to represent your overall theme and the mood you want your guests to feel as the event begins. In my case, I wasn’t doing anything that was a big departure from tradition with the ceremony and wanted to keep it solemn and respectful. I wanted my guests to feel calm and welcome while also establishing the faerie tale theme I was going for, so I chose soft chorals (all based on the Romantic poets) and instrumentals with an elegant and ethereal feel. For the playlist, I envisioned faeries or elves trooping through enchanted forests on their way to the castle. Here’s my prelude playlist.
Wedding Party Entrance
I gave the flower girl her own song full of well-wishes and childlike whimsy: Linda Arnold’s “I Wish I Was Magic”. This and these next few are all on my special moments playlist.
I kept the ethereal vibe going with Sissel’s “She Walks in Beauty”. The first time I ever heard this Lord Byron poem set to music in Vanity Fair, I just knew it was the one I wanted my beautiful bridesmaids walking down the aisle to (along with the lovely men in our lives, of course).
Bride’s Entrance
I knew I wanted to enter to the traditional Bridal March, but finding the right rendition of it was tricky at first. I listened to a bunch of them that were all one or two variations on the same–not enough fanfare, or too Elvis-Chapel-organ-y for my theme. Finally, I found the PERFECT version that is both dramatic and elegant, but also thematic. There’s a horn fanfare instead of an organ, with soft flutes in the middle, and it’s super extra in building up its announcement of me, like, “Look out, royalty coming through!” As soon as I heard it, I knew it was the one. See the special moments playlist above for this one.
Handfasting
Since our ceremony included a Celtic handfasting, we opted for “The Twisting of the Rope” played on Joanie Madden’s ethereal Irish whistle here. This one is also on the special moments playlist above.
Couple’s Recessional
Again, I wanted traditional, and managed to find a couple versions of Mendelssohn’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” with the same kind of sound as the bride’s entrance. See the special moments playlist for this one.
Cocktail Hour
While you’re busy getting bustled and taking photos with your family, your guests are left to their own devices (hopefully not their cell phones) for around an hour. You want them to feel entertained–excited by the lovely ceremony they’ve just seen and ready for a party and good food! So, while still keeping with my overall theme, I went for a very different tone here. I wanted lively and chipper tunes to get people feeling peppy, but still instrumentals so they could start conversations with each other without the distraction of lyrics. Here’s my cocktail hour playlist.
Grand Entrance
I could not think of anything more fitting at this moment in a faerie tale wedding than “Royal Fanfare and Reception at the Palace” by Paul J. Smith, from Disney’s Cinderella. It’s the part where people are arriving at the prince’s royal ball and the horns are announcing them. I used to get this one stuck in my head as a kid and go marching around with it like that. Never would have thought back then that it would one day play during such an important moment in my life! This one is on the special moments playlist.
Newlyweds’ First Dance
I definitely wanted to do some fancy, choreographed thing, but thought there was no way my guy was going to go for it. So I was trying to keep things simple and taught him the three most basic ballroom moves I remembered from cotillion. Little did he know I was longing for some twirls and fancy Regency-esque moves à la Pride and Prejudice or that Miss Mystic Falls dance from The Vampire Diaries. Imagine my shock and delight, then, when he told me, without my suggesting it, that he wanted to do exactly that! So we switched our song from “Once Upon a Dream” to “All I Need” by Within Temptation and followed the choreography from the show, with some tweaks. Our friend who was also our videographer helped us make a special cut of the song that was much shorter than the original, and we adapted our choreography to that. The original version is on the special moments playlist.
Dinner Music
The dinner music can be more or less a continuation of the cocktail hour music. I kept mine uplifting, but not so peppy as cocktail hour–more soft, serene, and soaring to keep people feeling happy and calm as they ate. Here’s my dinner playlist.
Mother-Son Dance
His mom picked out the most perfect song for them by Josh Groban, whom I just love! The lyrics to “You Raise Me Up” are so fitting and heartwarming for the moment, and the vaguely Celtic vibes about it just fit our theme seamlessly. Find this one on the special moments playlist.
Father-Daughter Dance
I chose Enya’s “May It Be” from Lord of the Rings. I wanted something that was both thematic and sentimental. This is also on the special moments playlist.
Reception Music
This was hard for me to do because of how much I just love to match everything to a theme, but try to think of the reception playlist as being not about you. This is for your guests, who have sat through and either enjoyed or endured your theme up until this point, to let loose with something familiar to them. This is where you choose popular songs that your guests will know, love, and want to dance to. There are a few ways you can go about this. One is to start a Spotify playlist of the most popular wedding reception songs, gathered from various people on the app and then cultivated. Another idea is to send out a little slip of paper with your invitations inviting people to name one song each that they love to dance to. This, we thought, was the perfect way to get an even spread of songs that would cover our entire demographic!
Ultimately, though, we decided to just let our DJ do what DJs do best and have fun with this portion of the night.
Grand Exit
My guy’s cheeky idea was for the last song of the evening to be Alkaline Trio’s “Love Love, Kiss Kiss”. I loved it. We went for it. It’s on the special moments playlist.
Other Music
We skipped these songs, but some of the other places you might want to choose one or two are for the bridal party’s entrance, a cake-cutting, a bouquet toss, a garter toss, or a final dance.
In case you missed it, you can read more about this wedding here and here.
Leave a Reply