I’ve always thought the 2nd movement of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony would be a great a funeral song. But not for me. I don’t want a funeral.
That’s one of mine too!
Love Divine, All Loves Excelling
How Can I Keep From Singing
the aforementioned Sing With All the Saints in Glory
John Prine - Please Don’t Bury Me
Woke up this morning
Put on my slippers
Walked in the kitchen and died
And oh what a feeling!
When my soul
Went thru the ceiling
And on up into heaven I did ride
When I got there they did say
John, it happened this way
You slipped upon the floor
And hit your head
And all the angels say
Just before you passed away
I won’t be having a funeral, just a cremation and ash scattering, and probably there won’t be anyone there except my nephew and his wife…but I would like them and, if there’s anyone else there, to raise a glass or two afterwards. I’ll probably steal some of the lovely pieces of music mentioned upthread, if they’d like to play something that sums me up and sends me on my way, but I’ll add this bit of fun:
Chandler Travis Philharmonic Chandler Travis Philharmonic / Bob What's-His-Name - YouTube
Do you have a translation for the lyrics?
That’s what I told my (now ex-) wife to play at mine. She said she wouldn’t do it.
My idea is to have that song played as I’m lowered into the ground.
As far as funeral services, I’ve said many, many times that I want everyone to have a Comedy Central-type Roast, where everyone is fair game, including myself.
D’oh! Forgot to add George Harrison, All Things Must Pass.
I choose “It’s a Small World (after all)”.
Serves everybody right.
Love that song. I may have to add it to my funeral list.
I’m having “More Than This”. I preferthe Roxy Music version, but the 10,000 Maniacs version is fine, too.
Followed by “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”, which will horrify some family and to which my friends will sing along.
Lyrics to “Shirakuen” (from this website)
“Don’t leave me”, you whispered in my ear
Your sigh drips on my neck as if you’re licking me
On the windowsill is an abandoned, candy-coloured spider lily now dead
When I touch it it feels like my dried up heart
Now, without a sound…"
In a chart compiled by a recent survey of UK funeral directors, this was #1
It’s gotta be something by Nick Cave, with Lay Me Low being the obvious choice. Or maybe I’ll get cremated, and have my friends and family sit through the full 15 minutes of Babe, I’m on Fire?
Or I’ll really make them feel it with Diamanda Galás version of Gloomy Sunday (aka the Hungarian Suicide Song).
Or, hell, that’d work too.
DO NOT POST FULL LYRICS TO SONGS, this is against the rules. I have taken out many of the full lyrics posted in this thread.
Wake me up before you go go.
It’s ironic and I don’t want people to linger so it would clear them out fast.
Or people can dance. I don’t care. I would be dead and don’t have to listen to it.
As a first stab at trying to come up with a funeral song for myself, I came up with this one. It’s mostly because I think the song is beautiful. It’s more about life than about death, but I think that’s a good thing.
I have argued with my husband about this! I want a marching band playing Rock & Roll Part 2 - or some other 70s rock anthem. He thinks I am kidding. I am not. Just donate a few hundred to a local high school with a decent marching band and have them show up at the cemetery in full regalia. If the cemetery objects, spot them another few hundred. It shouldn’t be that hard!
I have promised to haunt him if he doesn’t. You all are my witnesses.
Burn by John Wesley Harding off his Awake album.
I’ve got you so beat.
“Amazing Grace,” sure, but with the wealth of tunes in ballad meter (8.6.8.6), it would be a shame to settle for just one.
First two verses: to the tune of the “Leave It To Beaver” theme.
Second two verses: to the tune of “Pop Goes the Weasel.”
Last verse: to the tune of the “Gilligan’s Island” theme.
My survivors will be talking about that one for as long as they survive. 
On a related, um, note, during the Christmas season, I have a fondness for singing “O Little Town of Bethlehem” and “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” - to each other’s tunes.
Until just recently, I had never heard a song that said to me “This is what I want people to hear and think of me after I die.”
Because, as it turns out, the song had not existed until just recently.
I wish to go out to OneRepublic’s “I Lived”.
Going Home, the end theme from Local Hero
Simply a perfect piece of music.