Why do people play music at funerals?

When someone dies, the family is usually asked what music they’d like at the service. For many people, the answer is one particular song.

A researcher who studied funerals in Scotland found that music did five things in a service. It gave the service a shape, it drew people in or left them out, and it gave everyone something to do together, as when a congregation sings. It also stirred up feelings or shifted them, and it brought the person who died to mind.

In a 2020 Dutch study of personalized funerals, families chose a song because of its connection to the person. What the song meant in that person’s life mattered more than what its words said, and the researcher called it a “musical eulogy”.

All of this comes from interviews with families and from studies of what gets played. We didn’t find any trials of music at a funeral.

There isn’t a right answer. The song that was theirs is usually the one, and it can be sung, or played as an instrumental if the words would be too much.

In a 2022 Swedish study, researchers interviewed 12 people who had arranged a farewell for a relative. The people they spoke with tied the music to good memories of the person, and choosing it together gave the mourners something active to do. Those who had chosen the music in advance, with the relative who was dying, described that as a comfort before, during and after.

In a 2013 Australian study, researchers interviewed eight people who had cared for a family member who died. Music helped them still feel connected to the person. Some of them stayed away from particular songs for a while, to keep the sadness from being too much.

In a 2024 Dutch study, researchers compared 150 songs often played at funerals with 150 other songs. The funeral songs were less upbeat, lower in energy and more often acoustic.

In Britain, a large funeral company keeps a yearly list of the songs most requested at its funerals. Its 2025 list, as STV News reported it, included Time to Say Goodbye, My Way, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, You’ll Never Walk Alone and Abide With Me, which was the only hymn in its top ten. These come from the Netherlands and Britain, and they only show what other families have chosen.

It doesn’t have to be a hymn, and it can be. In the Scottish study, the researcher noted that as funerals have become more personal, the music has moved from mostly sacred to often secular.

If you’d like live music, a guitarist or a pianist can play the song that was theirs, and music as people arrive. A service a few days away is a normal request, and there’s more about how it works on our page about music for funerals and memorials.