Off the beaten aisle: ‘Here Comes the Bride’ is out; ‘Crazy Train’ is in

While planning their wedding, Rachel and Austin Keith steered away from the conventional when picking the music. Wagner’s “Bridal Chorus,” better known as “Here Comes the Bride,” wouldn’t work, nor would Pachelbel’s Canon in D, another longtime nuptial favorite.

“We didn’t use any of the traditional wedding songs,” Rachel explains.

Indeed.

When she came down the aisle on Dec. 18, SafetySuit’s “Never Stop” was playing; the married couple returned up the aisle accompanied by the theme to “How I Met Your Mother,” the song “Hey Beautiful” by the Solids.

They were riding in his car the first time Austin played “Never Stop” for her and it’s a special memory, Rachel says. “How I Met Your Mother” is “one of our favorite shows that we watch together, share together. It kind of matches our personalities,” she adds.

But don’t think the Keiths, both 20, are somehow the odd couple when it comes to choosing wedding music that really doesn’t sound like wedding music. These days, couples are picking personal songs, whether they’re for the bridal procession, the cutting of the cake or the first dance. Many couples are paying for their own weddings, so they’ll be darned if anyone is going to tell them what they can and can’t do, even if that means using Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train” somewhere in the proceedings.

“Who says you have to walk down the aisle to ‘Here Comes the Bride’?” Jill Sieracki, senior features editor of Brides magazine, told the Associated Press.

Hardly anyone these days.

Mike Key, owner of Chattanooga’s Mike Key Entertainment, says he rarely plays the “Bridal Chorus” any more. “In the past five years, maybe three times,” he says.

Canon in D remains popular, he says, but he’s also played Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust” when the bride’s garter is rubberbanding to the men and “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper for the tossing of the bouquet.

In one of his most eyebrow-raising moments, he was asked to play “The Imperial March” from “Star Wars” – yes, Darth Vader’s theme – when the mother of the bride was being seated.

Chattanooga’s Mark Douglas – aka DJ Mark – gives his couples a 25-page planning booklet that’s “full of song choices for every part of the wedding,” from the prelude to the reception. Each wedding section has its own list of songs, music that he’s carefully chosen to fit the moment.

“Nine out of 10 will look at that, then choose their own the songs,” he shrugs.

The wedding that stands out in his mind, though, took place in October 2015 when he was asked to play Richard Strauss’ “Also Sprach Zarathustra” (famously used as the theme to “2001: A Space Odyssey”) for the groom’s entry. Douglas says he edited the piece down to about a minute and was very happy with the end result.

Then the groom pulled him aside at the wedding.

“Five minutes prior to the ceremony, he told me, ‘I’m going to come out in a [wrestler] Ric Flair robe,'” Douglas recalls.

And so he did, feathers on the collar and wrists of the robe and a replica of Flair’s massive wrestling championship belt buckle at his waist. Douglas says his edited version of “Also Sprach Zarathustra” “was perfect” for the moment.

And yes, families on both sides knew what the groom had planned.

“It was amazing,” Douglas says.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Contact Shawn Ryan at sryan@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6327.