What music are you working to?

The pandemic is, quite sensibly, consuming a lot of our energy and most of us are stretched quite thin. I thought it would be nice to bring up something of a distraction, but also relevant to our lives right now. What music are you working to? (When you are able to work, that is.)

Now that I’m working from home, I’ve been using headphones frequently while I’m writing or doing other work.

There are a few kinds of music that work best for me, that might keep me in some kind of flow state. One thing I’ve discovered is that it has to be music that’s already very familiar to me. If I listen to something that’s new to me, then it keeps me from focusing on work. Non-instrumental stuff works great for me, but also if lyrics aren’t in English, then that seems to be fine with me too. But it seems any genre I’d normally listen to.

Lately, I’ve been writing well to: Rodrigo y Gabriela, Budos Band, the Beastie Boys instrumental album (The Mix Up), a variety of Bossa Nova including Celso Fonseca, Kamasi Washington, some Bhangra playlists I’ve come upon, and classic stuff including Dvorak and Copland.

What works for you? What doesn’t work for you? Any good working music you’d recommend?