I don't know what the restrictions are with the kind of music that can be played for these marches, but the parish, I believe, is quite lenient on this. After all, the marches themselves are beyond the Holy Mass, meaning, the mass only starts after the marches.
I believe the the wedding couple today had their own musicians who also played and sang liturgical music. They were not familiar to me.
After a rather long wait, I as wedding mass commentator, was given the go signal to start with the introduction. It felt a bit awkward after my introduction because there was silence. Nothing.
Normally, my introduction would cue the choir to play the usual processional march recording in our church's weddings. I wasn't sure what was going on until the mass assistant started shouting at the choir loft.
Then the guitar player played his electric guitar.
Playing or Tuning the Guitar
It didn't sound like a wedding march music. In didn't even sound romantic at all. There was a short guitar riff that sounded a bit familiar but that was all. The rest sounded like the player was practicing something or was getting his guitar tuned. It simply didn't set the mood for a wedding, at least not to me. I wonder what the everyone else inside the church felt especially the entourage that was walking during the march.
Well, the guy secondary sponsors didn't seem to mind. About 4 or them were tinkering with their gadgets when they reached their seats. One of them was actually talking on the phone while walking in the procession!
Then it was the bride's turn to walk. The bridal march had a lady at the choir loft singing to the guitar's accompaniment. The singer's voice provided variety to the otherwise dull and dry guitar playing. I just wished though that they used a recording for accompaniment (minus-one, karaoke). She would've sounded much better.
Credits to the guitar player and the choir though for getting through the liturgical (mass) songs flawlessly. They knew exactly which prayer responses were sung.
Lectors with Good Voices
I learned only today that the wedding couple had readers. Two ladies were quick to respond as readers in the wedding and had no qualms following me for the brief orientation. What surprised me was that they seemed confident about the parts that I oriented them on. They had a few questions but they didn't seem nervous at all.
When I heard them speak, wow! They were clear, audible and actually had very good voices. After the wedding mass, I thanked them and then learned that (surprise!) both of them were lectors in different parishes.
Before I left, I gave them a thumbs-up sign and congratulated them for their excellent job at the ambo.
