It’s the second week of the WF Weekend Forum and I’ve got a question for you.
It’s a little bit about inspiration and a little bit just pure curiosity. Do you listen to music while you’re writing? Do you listen to different music when you’re writing different things?
I know many of us write across genres – romance, science fiction or fantasy, erotica, women’s fiction – and I’m wondering if what you’re writing changes what music you’re listening to – or if you listen at all.
I’m the seldom-listen-at-all type but a friend who has soundtracks for every book sent me a copy of the soundtrack she’s been using for her newest book and I have to admit I’ve been fascinated. I might not go quite so far as to say hooked, but close. Prior to this soundtrack if I listened at all it was to a classical music station.
What about you? What’s your experience with music? And what are you listening to now?
Kate
This is a very timely question! I usually listen to Norah Jones while writing, but I recently had an especially productive afternoon with a public radio station on–playing bluegrass. It was perfect, and I think that’s because the novel I’m working on is set in the mountains of eastern Tennessee. I may try matching the music to the setting again.
Hi,
I don’t listen to any music. And I tune out all background noise and get into my story. But I do know a lot of writers who have a different soundtrack for each novel they work on.
Hi,
I don’t listen to any music. I need silence and block out all outside noise.
I can’t listen to anything while I write. I used to have my office upstairs next to the laundry room and I loved when the dryer was running, but now that I’m in the basement I need silence so I can hear if something is going on upstairs…
Hi,
I don’t listen to any music while writing. I need silence and can block out everything around me.
If I listen to music while I work, I end up listening to the words or the melody, and get distracted. I do like to choose music that suits my book and play it on my MP3 player while I walk before I start writing for the day. That gets me in the mood! I have a ’soundtrack’ set up for a couple of books, and listening to those songs gets me into my characters POV really quickly.
I don’t listen while I work. I used to write in my kitchen with my son and husband walking through, the TV on in the next room. But now I have my own office, and I usually work in silence. Like Michelle, I get distracted by the words or melody.
I have to have music on while I’m writing, but it can’t be music I “listen” to – it pulls me out and breaks my concentration. So I find classical the only answer. Sets a tone, but it isn’t intrustive.
It calms me when I freak out too!
I do listen to music and have different types of music, depending on the story. Sometimes I just listen to it on my iPod when I got out for a walk to get my creative juices flowing. And then I may or may not listen to it while writing – it just depends on where I am in the story.
When I was writing Restoration historicals, I listened to Henry Purcell who composed in the second half of the Seventeenth Century. By the end of the first week just the sound of the music starting put me into my book.
Now that I’m writing in the Tudor period, I can’t really follow my plan. Although I have albums by Tallis and Byrd, I find that music distracting so I’ve gone to movie music (Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice and my local clasical station. I cannot listen to words, only music and play it very low so that my brain is picking it up and I’m almost unaware.
I began this use of music a few years back from a similar discussion on another digest. I tried it and it worked for me. Still does.
Jeane Westin
I go through stages. For a number of early romances, I listened to Don Williams, country music. Then, while writing one book, a neighbor told me it was boring, and I realized I was into Don William’s ballads, so I changed to livelier music.
For ‘Driving Lessons’, one of the Valentine novels, I listened to George Strait. Now, as I’ve begun putting together a novel after 1 1/2 years away, I’ve listened a bit to vintage Swing. The new novel will take place mainly in 1951.
Thanks for giving me the prod. Maybe I’ll make sure to listen to music, and see if it inspires!
Curtiss Ann Matlock
I have to have quiet. I no longer have a real office (sewing room took it over like fabric kudzu–it was awful!) and I write all over the house on a laptop. The bad part is that my husband is a TV person and there is at least one on at all times of the day.
Hi. Up front confession, I’m a male. So what am I doing commenting on this page? Well first thing is that I don’t draw a distinction between male and female writers in terms of what they write. However, as we have different hardwiring in the brain (or so the brain specialists tell us), I am interested in how men and women might write differently – the process. I’ve often seen people commenting about listening to music when they write. I can’t do that and I’m just wondering if that’s because we male writers find it more difficult to multi-task? Is it that male brains generally don’t have the wiring to handle the two things at once? Or is this not a factor in whether a writer listens to music as they create their written work?
Chris Warren
Author and Freelance Writer
Randolph’s Challenge Book One – The Pendulum Swings
First, I don’t have anything specific that I listen to while writing currently. Often I’m writing while the TV is on and someone else is watching it. I like to be “with” my family while I write — at least in body! However, I have listened to Enya a lot while writing in the past — mainly because much of what they are singing isn’t distinct so I can ignore it, but the ebb and flow of sound is very freeing to my muse. I’m contemplating locating some early American music to spark my historical novels, though!
As for Chris’ question, my son listens to a wide variety of music while he writes his fantasy novels (think Eragon). He’s downloaded a lot of music from various places that he taps into as a muse even though he doesn’t really “enjoy” music.
Betty Bolte
Love never dies; it haunts the heart.
This is such a great question. Funny, I haven’t listened to music much when writing manuscripts however w/one of my tv pilot and one of my screenplays there were a number of songs that were important to me in order to find the right tone or vibe. I am considering trying this for the next book.
Maggie
This is a great conversation –
Chris, I’m not sure because a lot of men I know work with music on, and the TV on in the other room, and the radio with the news somewhere else. They seem to be able to tune into only what they want to hear. But I suspect that’s not gender-based, it’s just how you hear music.
But I did forget to tell you in this post that I read about a writer – he writes essays and a weekly column, I think, and I can’t remember who it was – who plays one song over and over and over again. He says that he HAS to finish the piece or the music will drive him crazy. He picks a different piece every week.
Be interesting to try it but for me? I’d probably be crazy in an hour!
Kate
I’m wicked late to this one (I’m blaming everything on Sudafed right now– that’s my excuse and I’m stickin’ to it!) but I couldn’t pass this one up. I’m a music hound, down to my bones. I have to write with music and in fact, I’m one of those who creates soundtracks (multiple ones sometimes) for manuscripts or specific scenes. I find that it really helps, in a Pavlov’s dog sort of way, to put me right in the mood or setting of the overall scene.
I think one of the reasons it works for me is that I generally hear music over lyrics– i.e., I can sing along with a tune after hearing it only once, but don’t ask me what the lyrics are, necessarily– that takes a specific sort of concentration I need to apply. So from that standpoint, I’m not generally pulled out of my own head when music is on. Some of the best scenes I’ve ever written, I think, have come because I’ve been so completely sunk into the emotion the music evokes in me.