Deathbed Ideal Discs

Building on the extraordinary success that was Desert Islands Discs, I now ask you for your eight selections for the pieces of music that you would want playing in your final hour as you lie on your deathbed, hopefully peacefully with friends and family around you (or whatever way you would prefer to go). Very different considerations, I think.

Slight change from before. In keeping with the D.I.D franchise, I am not going to allow you a whole album this time. Single tracks or movements only. Comments on selections appreciated, and preferably in countdown order. I want to know what you would like to be the last thing you ever listen to on this earth.

8 Roberta Flack – The first time ever I saw your face

Amazingly, I managed to go almost 30 years of my life without hearing this song. When I did, I almost crashed the car I was so distracted by it. As it nearly brought my deathbed that much closer, it seems appropriate to return the compliment.

7 Mozart – Cosi fan tutte – Soave sia il vento

3 minutes of bliss.

6 Pergolesi – Stabat Mater

Only came across this quite recently, and it is one of the most sublime things I have ever heard. Could hardly be more appropriate subject matter, either.

5 Joni Mitchell – Love (Corinthians II:13)

Too important an influence on me to leave out altogether, and this seemed the most appropriate choice. A wonderful setting to wonderful words.

4 Radiohead – No surprises

Perhaps not the most appropriate lyrics, but too beautiful a song to leave out, and I have too much of their work not to include something.

3 Bach – Cantata BWV 208 – Aria ‘Schafe konnen sicher weiden’

The piece that inspired this thread. Just for its beauty.

2 Bach – B minor Mass – Kyrie Eleison

You can’t leave this earth without listening to something from this piece one more time.

1 Arvo Part – Spiegel Im Spiegel

I heard this used as music for a documentary on the Holocaust, along with Gorecki Symphony No 3. Extraordinary documentary, wonderful choice of music. However, now I will always associate this music with this subject matter.

But perhaps no bad thing at the very end to be thankful for the extraordinary good fortune I have had in my life and to be reminded, but for the chance of where and when I was born, of the horrors I might have faced.

Beethoven piano concerto 5, "Emperor", second mvmt. such as this example:

YouTube

There is some audience background noise here, so probably not the best example.

I might run out of time. I need two deathbed hours to fit in all my selections.

1.Gott! Welch dunkel hier. Beethoven's Fidelio YouTube Appropriate to cry out to God about darkness in one's final hour.

2. I entirely agree with rank outsider about a Stabat Mater being quite appropriate and love Pergolesi's, but also love Verdi's in spite of being less devotional. Jiacopone da Todi's impressive poetry indeed a must
YouTube

3. Verdi's Te Deum also a must since one ought to be quite grateful to the Almighty for any and all gifts bestowed: YouTube

4. Beethoven's sublime string quaretet #14 in c-sharp minor, mvts 6-7:
YouTube

5. Selections from Haydn's Creation: YouTube

6. Cilea's "E la solita storia"(Lamento di Federico) from L'Arlessiana:
YouTube or alternatively Puccini's E lucevan le stelle from Tosca: YouTube
, a lament for missed opportunities, a languorous cry of self pity and regret.

7. Another Stabat Mater, this time Anotnio Caldara's wonderfully crafted work, inspirational, devotional and stimulating yet peaceful all in one:
YouTube

8. Finally Allegri's Miserere Meus Deus to begin ushering in the angels. That would bring my mood to a serenity of acceptance of impending passage into the next world and beg forgiveness at the same time in a humble manner pleasing to Our Lord.
YouTube

Originally posted by Rank outsider
I now ask you for your eight selections for the pieces of music that you would want playing in your final hour as you lie on your deathbed, hopefully peacefully with friends and family around you

Brian Eno & Robert Fripp - Evening Star (1975) Guitar, ambient, instrumental.

Miles Davis - In a Silent Way-It's About that Time (1969) Trumpet, saxophone, keyboards, bass, drums.

Phish - Crosseyed & Painless - 1996-11-02 Coral Sky Amphitheater, West Palm Beach, FL A long, live, jammed up version of the Talking Heads song.

Kenneth Leighton: Veris Gratia Op.9. (1950) Some suitably grave and yet uplifting classical music from mid-20thC Brit Leighton.

Keith Jarrett Trio - In Your Own Sweet Way - 3rd June 1994, Blue Note, Tokyo Could have chosen almost anything by this trio; they stretch out nicely on this tune.

Brian Eno & Harold Budd - First Light (1980) Minimal piano, textures, ambient.

Frank Zappa - Watermelon in Easter Hay (1979) Used to crash out at college to this when the consumables had finally taken their toll. Guitar instrumental.

Grateful Dead - Dark Star > St. Stephen > The Eleven > Turn on Your Lovelight - 'Live Dead' (1969) Spent decades happily searching hundreds of other version of this sequence in an effort to recapture or recreate the moment when I heard it for the first time; never succeeded.

Originally posted by mwmiller
Beethoven piano concerto 5, "Emperor", second mvmt. such as this example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr2AKxf8m14

There is some audience background noise here, so probably not the best example.

Where's the other seven picks, mwmiller? WE wants to know!

I just have the one.
When it's my time, I don't care to linger and make a long ordeal out of it. 🙂

Originally posted by mwmiller
I just have the one.
When it's my time, I don't care to linger and make a long ordeal out of it. 🙂

C'mon! Be a good sport, linger for a few minutes longer and after all by then a cure may have been discovered! Pearly gates won't have rusty hinges!

Originally posted by scacchipazzo
C'mon! Be a good sport, linger for a few minutes longer and after all by then a cure may have been discovered! Pearly gates won't have rusty hinges!

They have pearly gates down there too?!

OK, here goes. My chance to trash several languages all in one post....
These are in no particular order other than how they popped into my mind.
I'm not suggesting them for anyone else's deathbed scene, but they all would work for mine, along with plenty of others that I will probably remember later!

8. Midnight in Moscow by the Village Stompers
7. Unchained Melody by the Righteous Brothers
6. I can't get started by Al Hirt
5. Take 5 by the Dave Brubeck Quartet
4. Jazz a la Francais by Claude Bolling
3. Concerto de Aranjuez by Rodrigo (large variety of performers)
2. Dark Eyes by Itzhak Perlman and Oscar Peterson
1. Beethoven piano concerto 5 (Emperor)

Beethoven, Sonata #8 “Pathetique”

Pink Floyd “Shine on You Crazy Diamond”

Procol Harum “Whiter Shade of Pale” this version:

YouTube

Queen “Who Wants to Live Forever”

Electric Light Orchestra “I’m Alive”

Cat Stevens “Morning Has Broken”

Rachmaninoff, Opus 35 “Variations on a Theme by Paganini”

Grateful Dead “Truckin’”

Originally posted by sumydid
[b]1. The entire collection of the Moody Blues[/b]

Thank you, as ever, for responding entirely inappropriately to the OP.

I would want a mix of happy and sad stuff. (But none of it high-brow, see.)

* Leaving on a Jet Plane – Peter, Paul & Mary
* Master Jack – Four Jacks and a Jill
* Tell Me – Rolling Stones
* Made in Japan – Buck Owens
* I Should Have Known Better - Beatles
* Father and Son – Cat Stevens
* Nobody Else – Vince Guaraldi
* He Stopped Loving Her Today – George Jones

--Gotta end it on a song about a funeral, natch.--

8. Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield (YouTube): There must be one last moment of irony before I go!

7. Mozart's Rondo Alla Turca (YouTube): I just love this piece. It's cheerful and lively, and I'll definitely want to hear it one last time ... and smile.

6. Oops, I have to go. I'll finish later!

1. Songs of the Angels (YouTube) A perfect song for letting go and saying good-bye