the.com/recessional
The music that lets everyone leave without admitting the ceremony dragged.
means A hymn or piece of music played while a procession exits at the end of a formal ceremony, typically a church service or wedding.
from Rooted in the Latin 'recedere' — to go back, withdraw, retreat — the same root that gives us 'recede' and 'recess.' The word moved into church vocabulary to name the organ or choir piece accompanying clergy and wedding parties as they file back out the way they came in, the mirror image of the processional that brought them in. Kipling even borrowed it for the title of an 1897 poem, 'Recessional,' using the sense of a solemn withdrawal — empire fading, pomp receding — which helped cement the word's slightly wistful, exit-music feel in English well beyond the church aisle.
- origin
- from recession, the literal act of withdrawing
- common use
- closing march at weddings and graduations
- pace tell
- always faster than the processional, nobody argues why
- kipling link
- famous poem warns pomp and empires both fade