Wedding March. Many court composers have written marches for the weddings of royal and aristocratic brides, but Brit. brides have for long favoured entry into the church to the strains of the bridal ch. from Wagner's Lohengrin and exit to the wedding march which is the 6th no. of Mendelssohn's incidental mus. to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The vogue for the Mendelssohn began in 1847 and received a boost in 1858 when Queen Victoria's daughter, the Princess Royal, used it at her wedding. Its supremacy was dented in 1961 by the Duchess of Kent, who left York Minster to the Toccata from Widor's 5th Sym. for org., her example being widely followed. Various more bizarre mus. selections are occasionally reported.

wed·ding march • n. a piece of march music played at the entrance of the bride or the exit of the couple at a wedding.