Kristen-Michael Wedding

This past fall Kristen and Michael married in a beautiful, recently-refurbished church in Chicago’s north suburbs. The church had wonderful acoustics, making it a great place to play. Kristen was incredibly organized in her wedding plans, and we had almost all of her music selections finalized more than two months before her wedding. The following is the list of music Kristen requested:

Prelude: Somewhere Over the Rainbow (Arlen), Chasing Cars (Snow Patrol), Yellow (Coldplay), The Rose (from the movie “The Rose”), Somewhere in Time (Barry), The Wedding Song (Kenny G)
Parents/Bridal Party: The Prayer (Foster)
Bride: Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring (Bach)
*Psalm: This is the Day the Lord has Made (Psalm 118)
*Alleluia: Celtic Alleluia
Unity Candle: Air on the G String (Bach)
Presentation of the Gifts: Amazing Grace (Traditional)
*Communion Mass Parts (from “Mass of Creation”): Holy, Holy, Memorial Acclamation, Amen
Passing of the Peace: Winter from the “Four Seasons” (Vivaldi)
*Lamb of God: Agnus Dei
Communion: You Raise Me Up (Groban)
*Visit to Mary: Ave Maria (Bach/Gounod)
Recessional: Trumpet Voluntary (Clark)
Postlude: Bittersweet Symphony (The Verve), Fields of Gold (Sting), Time to Say Goodbye/Con te Partiro (Sartori)

*Denotes a piece in which we accompanied the singer.
Kristen requested an arrangement of The Prayer (Foster) for her bridal party which we were very happy to provide. She also had a specific vision for her processional using Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring. We were able to slightly alter our arrangement, and it fit the processional well. It was so much fun working with Kristen on her wedding music!

Congratulations Michael and Kristen!

It is typical for us to contact a number of people before your wedding day. For Kristen’s wedding we were in contact with her singer, pastor, church music director, day-of coordinator, as well as Kristen, in order to ensure that things moved as smoothly as possible.

New Arrangements

The White Lake Quartet has added some new music to our repertoire list in the past few months which we have listed below. Many of these are pieces were especially requested by brides. We also have added some of the pieces below to our music page.

Here, There, and Everywhere (Beatles)
Clocks (Coldplay)
Berceuse (Fauré)
The Prayer (Foster)
Falling Slowly from Once (Hansard/Irglová)
The Ludlows from Legends of the Fall (Horner)
Promise (Irizarry)
Billie Jean (Jackson)
Moon River from Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Mancini)
Can You Read My Mind from Superman (McGovern)
Three Divertimenti (Mozart)
Various Quartet Selections (Mozart)
Theme from Forrest Gump (Silvestri)
From This Moment On (Twain/Lange)

We are continually arranging music to add to our repertoire lists, most of which we write about on our blogs about specific weddings.

Rachael-Brian Wedding

On a day in early Fall, in Chicago’s near west suburbs, our quartet played at Rachael and Brian’s wedding.

Post-ceremony

The church’s music director played piano and sang during the service for a musical interlude and unity candle. We played the rest of the music for Rachael’s wedding:
Prelude requests: Somewhere Over the Rainbow (from the “Wizard of Oz”), Someone to Watch Over Me (from “Oh, Kay!”), and O Mio Babbino Caro (from “Gianni Schicchi”)
Parents/Grandparents: Ave Maria (Bach/Gounod)
Bridal Party: Main Theme (from “Forrest Gump”)
Bride’s Entrance: Falling Slowly (from “Once”)
Recessional: All You Need is Love (Beatles)
Postlude requests: Viva la Vida (Coldplay), Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 (Bach), Selections from The Four Seasons (Vivaldi)

The theme from “Forrest Gump” and “Falling Slowly” were special requests by Rachael and Brian, and we were happy to arrange these pieces for them.

Congratulations Brian and Rachael!

You do not need to have finalized your ceremony music before signing a contract with our ensemble. We ask that you give us any music selections not on our repertoire list at least 4 weeks before your wedding. All other selections are due 2 weeks before your wedding.

WLQ in action

Lindsay offered to send us photos of our quartet playing at her wedding, so of course we had to post them. They were taken by our friend Tim Tab who also gave us permission to use them on our website. Tim is a great photographer and you should check out his website and blog to see more of his work!

Lindsay and Mike’s Wedding

On a warm, sunny day, our quartet played for Lindsay and Mike’s wedding. Although their wedding was indoors, the front of the room had floor-to-ceiling windows, making it possible to see the entire park across the street. Lindsay requested the following for her ceremony:

Prelude: Aria (Handel), Serenade (Schubert), “Air” from Water Music Suite (Handel), “Minuet” from Sonata in G (Beethoven), and Air on the G String (Bach)
Bridal Party Processional: Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring (Bach)
Bridal Processional: Canon in D (Pachelbel)
Interlude: “Can You Read My Mind” from Superman (McGovern)- Lindsay’s sister sang with us.
Sand Ceremony: On Wings of Song (Warren)
Recessional: Trumpet Voluntary (Clarke)
Postlude: Quartet No. 4 in C Major (Mozart) and Eine Kleine Nacht Music (Mozart)

The postlude was followed by a cocktail hour in an outdoor courtyard. The fountain even had ducks swimming in it! Lindsay wanted to choose all her cocktail hour music and requested 15 pieces from genres including: Classical/Opera, Broadway/Film, and Swing.

We arranged two special pieces for Lindsay’s wedding: “Can You Read My Mind” from Superman (McGovern) arranged for string quartet and voice, and “Moon River” from Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Mancini) arranged for string quartet, which we played at the cocktail hour.

Congratulations Lindsay and Mike!

We have received a few questions lately about choosing an order for pieces during prelude, postlude, and cocktail hour. For preludes, one can either order the pieces to build up slowly, with the processional as the final climactic moment, or can place slower pieces nearer the end to make the processional “pop” in context. When mixing genres, as many people do for their cocktail hour, one can 1. group all the classical music together then all the pop music or 2. group a few of each genre together and alternate these groups.