Writing Music?

[Chris Guillory]

Curious to know what you all listen to when creating those masterpieces. Do you have music for the mood? Is music a distraction for you writers who lock yourselves in a dark cabin without electricity and internet?

I have two favorites in Pandora, one being my Cillo station, the other Hans Zimmer. Reason being, neither of these have songs with lyrics. I'm fine with music, but I find voices distracting.

 

[tinkerdan]

I have a constant flow of elevator music.

Perhaps that's why my writing has its: Ups and Downs.

 

[Devon.Q.Ly]

Hi Chris,
I listen to different types of musics to get into different mood. I just type the type of music i'm looking for into youtube and then just buy the stuff i like. epic, majestic, wonder etc. I listen to pandora and Hans zimmer too, relaxdaily has some good stuff also. I've talked to a few people and the common theme is that they too find it better when the music has no words or no words that they can recognize.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Beautiful silence for me. I have music that inspires things and what not but can't write to it.

 

[Juliana]

I prefer silence, too.

 

[Kerrybuchanan]

I rarely get silence, but I don't use any particular music. Usually the local radio station is on in the background somewhere, but when I'm writing I seem to be able to zone everything out to the point where people have to physically punch me to get my attention. That happens a lot...

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

No I can't listen to music either while I write. It'll either annoy me and thus distract me, or it'll be something I like and I'll listen to it and forget to write.

However, for a time I was able to listen to Enya while I worked. It seemed to have the right mix of soft melody to let me relax into the work but with a lack of beat in most parts and a lack of vocals that made sense to my ears. Oddly, Clannad didn't do the same for me.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[Phyrebrat]

I prefer silence when I write but I listen to certain music when I am on a walk to get inspiration - almost exclusively Kate Bush.

pH

 

[caters]

I listen to classical music(only instrumental though, not opera, opera is an occasional, non-writing thing for me). But I don't listen to any specific pieces in any specific order or frequency. And I also don't usually base the writing off of the music, just use the music to help me concentrate and keep me from getting stressed out about tiny errors and details. I mean sure I don't usually get stressed out in the first place(and when I do it is normally about something like "How is my math wrong? I did all the right steps and even checked my work, so how is it wrong?" and turns out to be either a not so obvious mistake, an obvious mistake that I somehow missed, or a sort of kind of mistake(what I mean by that is, it isn't really a mistake in the math, just the form it is in(like decimal when asking for fraction or square root in denominator when asking for the rationalized solution)) but still, I like to prevent myself from getting any kind of stress(physical, non-exercise stress(like injury), emotional stress(most often anger and sadness), and mental stress(mistakes, bad dreams(bad dreams are partly emotional and physical stress as well)) and music helps with that.