BellaOnline Forums Career Nonfiction Writing Music to write by...

LOL well it's good to know what works best for you! I do agree if I listen to something too lively it makes me want to get up from my desk

There is a another free radio site called slacker.com. You can pick your own groups that you want to hear and I believe if you pick fifteen artists that what will play. You can also pick a type of music you want to hear and they play a variety of groups from that genre.

Check it out. It's free and it is way cool. (Do the kids say way cool anymore? lol.)

If I really need to focus, I like instrumental (guitar, piano), also non-verbal. Native American flute music is wonderful. Jim Brickman, new agey kind of stuff, and others. Both sides of the brain get to work at the same time, I guess.

I like Phillip Glass for undistracting music. Like other posters, I prefer instrumental only when working.

It's always good to take a break even from that though. Sometimes, there's nothing as good as the sound of silence if you really need to concentrate. Half an hour total silence can see strange at first, but it's worth trying from time to time to really focus and crystallise those points!

I'm totally into silence.......I find music of any kind distracting.

I don't know why this image has stuck with me for 25 years now, but I'll never forget this commercial for silent records! They showed an older man and women sitting and smiling happily as the listened to their record, on the record player, that was nothing but silence.

I'd buy that record. :-)

I, too, need instrumental music when I write. If I play music with singing, I find myself singing along and that is much too distracting for writing.

I'm one of the few writers I know who NEEDS complete silence when I write. I tried listening to music for awhile, but it just doesn't work.