Thursday, July 4, 2013

Music?

I don't typically listen to music while I write.  It distracts me too much.  However, something as simple and short as this post (due to the fact that I'm on vacation) can be written while listening to a song.  At the moment I'm listening to A Thousand Years by Christina Perri on my Pandora app (I'm typing on my iPad mini).

I see where listening to music can aid some people's writing.  The expression of emotion through song is powerful, allowing you to transfer those emotions into your prose.  Sometimes.  If you're good at it.  Unfortunately, my writing suffers when I'm exposed to too much emotion.  I learned that the ideas I typically get while watching movies are best left as an outline until I've let the ideas simmer for at least a night.  That, coupled with the noise, is why I don't tend to write while listening to music?

How about you?  Music?

13 comments:

  1. I've never been able to listen to music while writing. I desperately wish I could. I've tried. I can't. It's almost as distracting to me as an interesting movie.

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    1. I haven't actually tried a whole lot, I just know that my writing will suffer if I do nine times out of ten. Thanks for stopping by. I was beginning to think I was slipping back into a zero comment streak...

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    2. Nah, I just fell behind (yet again) as I tread the deep waters of life.

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  2. I don't usually listen to it while I'm working on my WIP. Too many times, I've caught myself typing the lyrics instead of what I was thinking about writing ;-)

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  3. I listen to music while I write because I try to go for a more poetic prose. I'm heavily influenced by both music and literature, although certain types of music can be very distracting at times.

    -Matt

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  4. I can write in silence but I do best with background noise like music, TV in the background, or the other people sharing a coffee shop with me. I concentrate best when there are things I need to ignore. I grew up in a large family so I'm used to blocking out the noise.

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    1. I've always wanted to write in a coffee shop. The closest one is fifteen minutes away, so it isn't really reasonable to write there often. Thanks for dropping by.

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  5. I usually write while listening to music, but sometimes I bust out Rainy Mood. :)

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    1. I've looked into Rainy Mood. It's cool. I may have written one flash piece while listening to it.

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  6. I almost always have music on when I write. I think I typed the last half of my first novel while listing to "Awake My Soul" by Mumford and Sons. For some reason that song spoke to me. I can't listen to just anything. Some songs are distracting. It all depends on what I'm writing. I can not, CAN NOT have the TV on while I write. It mangles up my thought process somehow.

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    1. Very interesting. I've listened to songs repeatedly, but never that repeatedly. Perhaps I'll check it out some time, if I haven't heard it already without recognizing the title.

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