One of my clients will have the beautiful song "Unchained Melody" sung at their wedding by a friend. I love this song, and wanted to know more about it to see whether there was something especially nice I could say about it in the introduction to the performance. So, I started Googling and was astounded to find the history of this song, in the form of an in-depth article by Linda de Nicola.

The song that so many of us love was actually written back in 1936 by love-struck teen William Stirrat, who idolised local girl Mary Louise "Cookie" Pierce but was too shy to approach her. He wrote the lyrics under the pen name of Hy Zaret, and his friend Alex North (who later went on to write the musical scores for several big Hollywood films) wrote the music.

The song wasn't publicly released, however, for almost 20 years after it was first written. The rest, as they say, is history. The song has been recorded roughly 500 times. The song that is titled the "Unchained Melody" is such a timeless classic it should be retitled the "Undated Melody", because it still brings joy to listeners world wide today.

William did not win the girl of his dreams, as it turned out in the end. She married someone else and William married another girl, Bernice, with whom he has spent many decades in a happy marriage.

You can read more about this fascinating story online at: http://newstranscript.gmnews.com/news/2003/1203/Front_Page/047.html

In researching orchids for a client's ceremony, I searched poetry databases for suitable poetry about these gorgeous perennial plants that I might be able to use. Imagine my surprise to find that every poem I looked at was filled with sexual imagery. One poem that was highly rated on one online poetry forum basically described the orchid as a phallus.  This would certainly not do for my clients, whose brief to me was: "we want a classic, romantic wedding."

Perplexed, I raised this with my celebrant association e-group and then discussed it with a friend, Jenny Cram. Jenny, a very knowledgeable celebrant, told me that the term "orchid" is derived from the Ancient Greek word "orchis", which means "testicle".  Apparently the eroticisation of the orchid has come from the erotic after-effects of eating orchids and so they have long been associated with sex! No wonder all the poetry I've looked at has included sexual imagery!

I will keep searching for suitable poetry and if I can't find anything to meet my clients' brief I may have to write something.

Shazz

Last November I performed a ceremony for a couple on North Stradbroke Island.  During the lead-up to the ceremony the best man revealed that he had no cufflinks for his hired suit. With the wedding due to start in less than 30 minutes, and no place to readily obtain cufflinks on Straddie, I came to the rescue with a pair of strong steel clips taken from my Marriage Register. Normally used to hold the paperwork in place at weddings, these "cufflinks" proved to be most effective. They did a sterling job of holding the best man's sleeves in place and no one knew the flash of silver at his wrists was actually a pair of $2.50 metal clips from Officeworks!!!

Shazz

Q. How long does it take to create a ceremony masterpiece?

A. As long as it takes...

I have spent a total of 7.533 hours creating an extraordinary ceremony for my clients marrying next month. It took some 3,246 words over 17 pages, all up, and will take approximately 30 minutes to deliver on the wedding day.

I'd made 34 revisions to the text before the first full draft was complete and ready to be emailed to my clients for viewing.

Sometimes I don't think that the general public understands quite what is involved in developing an original ceremony. Most celebrants use pre-written ceremonies with blank spaces for names to be inserted, but I'm not like that because I don't believe you can say the same things about different people. I write all my ceremonies individually based on the things that are important to the clients.

Timewise, ceremony development for me can range anywhere from 2 hours to this - 7.533 hours or more if needed.  That is a lot of time when you consider it is just one aspect of the work I do as a marriage celebrant. Factor in the time it takes to complete legal paperwork and administraterion, prepare documents for the wedding in calligraphy, print out quality copies for the clients, reading sheets for readers, develop and make certificates for children, and then travel to the venue for a rehearsal (full service ceremonies only) and then back again for the wedding - sometimes this can exceed 20 hours.  I'm sure this will surprise those people who believe that celebrants simple sign papers and work for 20 minutes on the wedding day.

Of course, not all weddings will take so long to develop as this one. This particular ceremony required a lot of creative development because the couple had specific things in mind at specific points in the ceremony, requiring me to do a lot of research and hunt for information that I could use in the development process. The end result is something I'm really pleased with. Now I just have to await feedback from my clients...

Shazz