Funeral Blues and piano in a collection of settings of Auden poems under the title "Cabaret Songs". "Funeral Blues" is copyrighted by the Estate of W. H. Auden. According to The W. H. Auden Society, only Random House, Faber & Faber, and Curtis Brown Ltd. can give permission to reprint the text. It is the English contribution to the statue commemorating the Heysel Stadium disaster, where a retaining wall collapsed, resulting in 39 deaths on 29 May 1985, when Liverpool F.C. played Juventus FC in the European Cup final. The poem is read in its entirety in the 1994 British romantic comedy
Blues Funeral Canada in May. "Blues Funeral" was released to positive critical acclaim. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 77, based on 26 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews." "MOJO" reviewer Keith Cameron said that "no other singer of his generation plumbs the depths so credibly, or does mournful with such grace," awarded the album a full five stars and referred to it as an "instant "MOJO" classic." Tom Hughes of "The Guardian" awarded the album three out of five stars and described it as "bluesy, lugubrious,