Royal London’s National Funeral Cost Index report 2020 found that the average cost of a funeral in 2020 is £3,837.
In the report, Julie Dunk (Chief Executive at Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management) mentioned that ‘the cost of providing burial and cremation services continues to rise, and fees therefore continue to rise to offset such costs… Investment in equipment is also required to meet customer expectations, for example music and sound systems, and screens to show photos during a funeral service. Webcasting and/or recording of services are also now much in demand, requiring investment in suitable systems’, showing where some of these price increases are coming from.
This got us thinking about funerals and the songs that we choose to play when saying goodbye to our loved ones. Read on to find out more…
Using Google Suggest and Spotify Data
Just over 50 songs were chosen for the research using Google’s top suggestions for the search term “funeral songs”. Then the number of plays for each song was collated using Spotify (for the song’s top result) before ordering the songs by most to least plays to allocate each song’s final ranking position.
As of 29/12/2020, the data showed that:
Rank | Song name | Artist | Year | Spotify plays 29/12/2020 |
1 | Supermarket Flowers | Ed Sheeran | 2017 | 4,541,919,234 |
2 | See You Again | Wiz Khalifa | 2015 | 1,129,818,248 |
3 | Another One Bites the Dust | Queen | 1980 | 911,909,189 |
4 | Highway to Hell | AC/DC | 1979 | 681,636,724 |
5 | Stairway to Heven | Led Zeppelin | 1971 | 506,688,822 |
6 | Lay Me Down | Sam Smith | 2014 | 472,785,716 |
7 | Knockin' on Heaven's Door | Guns N' Roses | 1987 | 331,771,710 |
8 | Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) | Green Day | 1997 | 331,290,481 |
9 | Take Me Home, Country Roads | John Denver | 1971 | 315,494,924 |
10 | My Heart Will Go On | Celine Dion | 1997 | 287,072,949 |
Click here to see the rest of the top funeral songs of 2020 according to our research...
11 | Free Bird | Lynyrd Skynyrd | 1973 | 286,538,441 |
12 | I'll Be Missing You | Sean Combs | 1997 | 280,974,861 |
13 | My Immortal | Evanescence | 2000 | 274,519,233 |
14 | Spirit in the Sky | Norman Greenbaum | 1969 | 263,917,488 |
15 | Angels | Robbie Williams | 1997 | 252,784,706 |
16 | (I've Had) The Time of My Life | Bill Medley | 1987 | 231,015,763 |
17 | If I Die Young | The Band Perry | 2010 | 187,796,813 |
18 | Over the Rainbow | Israel Kamakawiwo'ole | 1990 | 180,490,365 |
19 | In My Life | The Beatles | 1965 | 158,851,710 |
20 | Bridge Over Troubled Water | Simon and Garfunkel | 1970 | 139,931,409 |
21 | Broken Halos | Chris Stapleton | 2017 | 139,197,694 |
22 | Angel | Sarah McLachlan | 1997 | 113,732,565 |
23 | One Sweet Day | Mariah Carey | 1995 | 95,938,908 |
24 | Candle in the Wind | Elton John | 1973 | 88,638,118 |
25 | Tears in Heaven | Eric Clapton | 1992 | 82,986,845 |
26 | You Raise Me Up | Josh Groban | 2003 | 69,230,435 |
27 | You Raise Me Up | Westlife | 2005 | 61,584,177 |
28 | Who Wants to Live Forever | Queen | 1986 | 57,971,012 |
29 | You'll Never Walk Alone | Gerry | 1963 | 46,537,027 |
30 | Dance with My Father | Luther Vandross | 2003 | 39,265,187 |
31 | Wind Beneath My Wings | Bette Midler | 1988 | 38,960,350 |
32 | I'll Be Seeing You | Billie Holiday | 1944 | 38,234,563 |
33 | I'm Already There | Lonestar | 2001 | 37,230,926 |
34 | Wish You Were Here | Pink Floyd | 1975 | 29,411,342 |
35 | When I Get Where I'm Going | Brad Paisley | 2005 | 27,173,390 |
36 | Always Look on the Bright Side of Life | Monty Python | 1989 | 23,376,931 |
37 | We'll Meet Again | Vera Lynn | 1943 | 20,694,570 |
38 | To Where You Are | Josh Groban | 2001 | 19,581,554 |
39 | Go Rest High on That Mountain | Vince Gill | 1994 | 14,356,048 |
40 | Keep Me in Your Heart | Warren Zevon | 2003 | 13,672,575 |
41 | Who You'd Be Today | Kenny Chesney | 2005 | 9,665,048 |
42 | I Will Remember You | Sarah McLachlan | 1993 | 7,586,495 |
43 | Jealous of the Angels | Donna Taggart | 2013 | 7,062,983 |
44 | Mama | Il Divo | 2004 | 6,178,280 |
45 | I'll See You Again | Westlife | 2009 | 5,706,516 |
46 | Goodbye's (The Saddest Word) | Celine Dion | 2002 | 4,349,814 |
47 | Heaven Was Needing a Hero | Jo Dee Messina | 2010 | 3,233,967 |
48 | Bring Me Sunshine | Morecambe and Wise | 2000 | 1,696,112 |
49 | Nothing Compares to You | Sinead O'Connor | 1990 | 1,632,419 |
50 | Song for Dad | Keith Urban | 2002 | 1,504,205 |
51 | Goodbye My Friend | Linda Ronstadt | 1989 | 1,231,723 |
52 | Time to Say Goodbye | Sarah Brightman | 1995 | 949,549 |
53 | Thank You for Being My Dad | Jon Barker | 2019 | 230,269 |
54 | A Celebration of Life | Funeral Music | 2012 | 75,600 |
The analysis found that 2017 hit Supermarket Flowers by Ed Sheeran took the top spot, with 4,541,919,234 plays. Following Supermarket Flowers, See You Again by Wiz Khalifa claimed the silver. Interestingly, Another One Bites the Dust by Queen, Highway to Hell by AC/DC and Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin also featured in the top 5.
Looking at the wider top 50, Queen, Westlife, Josh Groban, and Sarah McLachlan appeared multiple times. Mariah Carey, Elton John, The Beatles, and Celine Dion also featured.
Lyric Analysis
To gather more insight into the topic, we also analysed the lyrics of the top 10 songs to discover which specific words featured most regularly. 53 words were repeated 5 times or more amongst the 10 songs, with “one” (39), “door” (27), and “heaven” (26) as the most common words used.
The top 10 words included:
- One – 39
- Door – 27
- Heaven – 26
- Another – 24
- See - 22
- Highway – 20
- Dust – 19
- Time – 15
- Again – 13
- Heart – 12
“Highway” and “dust” appeared due to heavy repetition in the respective songs ‘Highway to Hell’ and ‘Another One Bites the Dust’.
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Disclaimer: Cavendish Online are not liable or responsible for the accuracy of the advice provided by third party experts, nor for the content or operation of any third-party websites, webpages, or resources which have been linked to within this article. *Information correct as of 29/12/2020