Michael Nyman - The Hut

The Hut comes from Nyman's one movement Piano Concerto which is based on music from The Piano and is split into several named sections. The Hut is the fast-paced third section with a syncopated piano theme.

Music While You Work CDs

We've posted about the wartime BBC radio programme Music While You Work elsewhere and you can now buy CDs of some of the favourite pieces which were brought together to provide psychological uplift to British workers during WWII as they worked their way towards victory. Originally these came as around 400 78s from Decca including popular tunes, light classics and film music as well as musical lollipops. Guild records are republishing lots of light music and have two special CDs dedicated to Music While You Work. Click on the Guild link above to reach a page where you can also listen to some lovely free excerpts from volume 2 or here for volume 1 where there's lots more background material about the pieces.

Music while you work – Erik Satie

Although he’s known best for his Gymnopédies, Satie also wrote the less widely known Musique d’ameublement, or Furniture Music, which was to be played ‘for people not to listen to’, the forerunner of Muzak (only much, much nicer). There's an excellent description of this by Orenella Volta in the sleevenotes to the CD of Yutaka Sado conducting Satie and the Orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux (Erato) which features examples. "He had noticed – long before recorded music became widespread – that people liked to have a background of sound as they went about their daily tasks," she writes, "but without having to pay too much attention to it, so he came up with an idea for a consumer product especially designed with this in mind. It was to consist of pieces named after the places in which it was to be ‘used’ (a bistro, a living room, etc). Each piece was to be made up of an assortment of motifs taken preferably from the repertoire of composers one dislikes. These motifs were to be repeated an unspecified number of times – ‘as often as one wants, but no more than that’ – by musicians positioned in the four corners of the room. The aim was to surround the audience – who were busy talking, walking around, or drinking – with sound.’

Music while you work – Scott Pack

Scott Pack, the former Buying Manager for Waterstone's and now Commercial Director of The Friday Project, the world's first exclusively web-to-print publisher, has an interesting selection of music at his Me and My Big Mouth blog called Soundtrack To The Blog. "I tend to have 2 or 3 CDs on heavy rotation when working at home," he says and lists current favourites in his sidebar, with YouTube links. His choices include Bellowhead, Juana Molina ("a beautiful voice, a beautiful website and hypnotic songs. Her new album, Son, is her best yet and seems to be permanently on the stereo next to my reading chair") and Juliana Hatfield. There's also a couple of marvellous postings illustrating his bookshelves.

Music while you work – Saatchi Gallery

The Saatchi Gallery has an ongoing series of articles on its blog site on what music artists listen to while they work. Entries so far include:
* Richard Misrach
* Luis Gispert
* Idris Khan
* Chloe Piene
* Una Hunderi
* Eirik Johnson

No disrespect to these artists, but even if you've never heard of them before, it's interesting to see what they listen to and how it relates to their work. I particularly like the quote from Una Hunderi who says: "I normally don't use music to boost the creative process or to get new ideas, rather it seems to be a medium which underlines or illustrates what I am working on at that specific moment."

Music while you work – C86

I had a surprising number of emails from readers following the post last week about mood music and the Mighty Lemon Drops. They came from a mixture of late-thirtysomethings enjoying a trip down Nostalgia Avenue (just off Indie Crescent) and other readers too young to remember the giddy days of Bogshed, Half Man Half Biscuit, and the Close Lobsters (pictured). For those who want to continue the trip, have a good look round the marvellous Indie MP3 - Keeping C86 Alive! blog and in particular this post about C86 where you can download the tape in its entirety. Apologies to readers for whom the above simply makes no sense at all.

Music while you work – mood music

Make the music fit the mood - that's the mantra for all homeworkers with the iTunes or radio on (and was recognised in this 1942 Time magazine article in which an American housewife says: "the second movement of Beethoven's Ninth is just the right rhythm for polishing the 'furniture; the second movement of his Fifth is a mopping-the-kitchen-floor rhythm. Siegfried Idyll makes picking mud up from the children's boots not irksome in the least."). Last week I wrote about what music I played when I felt relaxed. When I'm irritated on the other hand, instead of playing something calming, I tend to turn to loud music from my teenage years. One example is The Mighty Lemon Drops, a terribly underrated band from Wolverhampton who should have been as big as Oasis. You can hear a (atmospherically early) live version of Something Happens from 1986 here, courtesy of Tom Bartlett's In Everything You Do site. And then go out and buy their excellent album World Without End.

Music while you work – birdsong

When I'm in a relaxed mood I often play birdsong on my computer (though not when I'm in an irritated mood and want to calm myself down- I'll post about what I play then next week). You can buy several high quality CDs of birdsong including ones with experts identifying the calls bird by bird, though my preference is just to have the dawn chorus wash over me. There's certainly plenty to listen to at the excellent Wildsong site which also has many other examples of natural soundscapes as well as birds - for example, click here to hear a seasonal Mistle thrush.

Music while you work – Musicovery

Musicovery is a good site to try out if you've got not much to do since it's more likely to stop you working than improve your performance: it is like a family tree of many genres of music, including classical and jazz, which you can decide to follow or alter by your mood swing. First you pick a genre, then decide whether you want something energetic, calm, dark or positive, then what decade(s) and it chooses for you and then suggests where you might want to branch out to next in a very visual graphic format. It’s not as confusing as it sounds. Mostly good choices though not sure that West Side Story really belongs in the classical section. It’s free though there is a higher definition paid-for service too.

Music While You Work - Christmas

I like listening to carols but find that I end up singing them and doing no work. So as a better combination I have two largely instrumental recommendations for the coming weeks. The first is from Chandos, Vaughan Williams: Christmas Music which includes premiere recordings of his Fantasia on Christmas Carols (based on the traditional English carols ‘The Truth sent from above’, ‘Come all you worthy gentlemen’, ‘On Christmas Night’ and ‘There is a fountain filled with blood’) and On Christmas Night which also features some very familiar carols, as well as the first CD version of his nativity play The First Nowell. Marvellous singing from Kathleen Ferrier Award winner soprano Sarah Fox and big name baritone Roderick Williams as well as the Joyful Company of Singers all under the baton of VW specialist Richard Hickox.

Secondly, at budget price, from Naxos is Victor Hely-Hutchinson: A Carol Symphony which contains the famous work used for the television and radio productions of The Box of Delights as well as Bryan George Kelly’s Improvisations on Christmas Carols, Peter Warlock’s Bethlehem Down, Philip Lane’s Wassail Dances and Patric Standford’s A Christmas Carol Symphony.

Peace and quiet

One of the joys of homeworking is that there are no other fools around to get in your way. Two nice examples of what this can mean are at Andrew Cencini's blog who talks about the pleasure of looking out of his window at a nice tree and listening to birdsong and at Steve Richards' always interesting Adventures in Home Working blog where he talks about concentration, music and meditation. Steve frequently writes about homeworking issues, especially technical/design ones, so it's worth taking a look at his site regularly (it's in the links bar on the left hand column). Here he is on the power of music: "Just by chance last week I was listening to music set to random and some meditation music started playing, I rapidly noticed that my concentration improved, particularly the time I could concentrate for increased any my typing speed nearly doubled. I was pretty shocked that music could have such a significant effect so I tried again a couple of days later and it worked. I am now planning to build it into my normal working practice."

Homeworking headphones

Today's issue of The Guardian has a piece about headphones to use with your computer in their Business Sense pullout. Their suggestion for the home worker is the Jabra BT620s. "These are elegant headphones," says writer Guy Clapperton, "for anyone who wants to listen to music yet still be alerted whenever their IP phone or mobile goes off. The sound quality is excellent for the size of phones and they're comfortable to use - although they're not adjustable. The concealed microphone is a nice touch as long as your needs are relatively simple. Making calls is fine, but for podcasting you'd need to spend more money...For the mobile user who wants the option of automatic call alerts while listening to music, this is an excellent option."

As I type, it's not up on their website but if you click the above link the whole article should be in the next day or two with all the other recommendations for executives, travellers, etc. More about the Jabra's range at their website here.

Music While You Work - starting/stopping

As well as having favourite pieces of music or programmes I listen to while I work (and with the Ashes just about to start Test Match Special will be on fairly constantly again), I also tend to use the same pieces when I'm starting or finishing something. While I'm mulling things over I like something without any words and often play Ralph Vaughan Williams' 'Pastoral' Symphony Number 3 (it has some marvellous horns). You can hear excerpts of it at the Amazon web site. But when I'm finishing something, especially a biggish project, I tend to stick on Barry White, a celebrational formula which I picked up from fellow journalist Mary de Sousa while working with her in Spain. You can't beat You're The First, The Last, My Everything.

Homeworking musicians

If you're a professional musician, having a space to homework is vital. This article at Sound on Sound magazine takes a look at the various possibilities including a garden office/shed, the cellar or attic, garage, box room, and even lowering the floor within a typical small home, and also looks at the kind of work that each space might require to make it usable.

Music While You Work - online radio

If you haven't already discovered the delights of online radio stations, it's worth investigating what's out there. One of the biggest names in radio, the BBC, has a very successful online radio presence which also includes a facility which allows you to listen to programmes up to seven days after they have been broadcast so you can choose when to listen at a convenient time on demand. So, for example, I listen to the Early Music Show (broadcast on Saturdays and Sundays on Radio 3 when I’m often not close to a radio) on Mondays and Tuesdays.

An easy way to make your own ‘radio station’ is to click onto the excellent free service at Pandora, a spinoff from the Music Genome Project which has analysed thousands of examples of popular and easy listening music. Just type in a favourite artist or song and pandora creates a ‘radio playlist’ for you, then plays it over your computer.

And there's a truly enormous range of stations on www.live365.com. For example, Brass Band Radio plays what it says on the tin but you only have to type in the kind of music you like and it will find somebody, somewhere playing it.

Music While You Work - light music

Rather than any single piece of music, this week I'm recommending that you give a whole genre a try, light music. It's hard to pin it down exactly, but essentially it's quite jolly, jaunty music, on the easy listening side of classical - think the theme tune to Desert Island Discs (By the Sleepy Lagoon by one of the kings of light music, Eric Coates). It's perfect for a Friday.

Go here to download free one of the most famous pieces of light music, Jumping Bean, by another of its leading lights, Robert Farnon. Or you can also listen to Brian Kay's Light Programme every Thursday afternoon on BBC3 or for a week after on its Listen Again player.

Music while you work - Sting/Dowland

The homeworking world is divided. Those who work in sheds and those still in the dining room. Those who work in suits and those who prefer pyjamas. And of course, those who listen to music while they work and those who work in silence. In 1940 the BBC came up with a cunning wartime plan to up productivity. Music While You Work (its marvellous theme tune by Eric Coates was called Calling All Workers) was a non-stop medley of popular tunes which ran until the Light Programme bit the dust in 1967.

Of course the music was strictly monitored. Nothing lethargic or unmelodic was allowed. Slow waltzes were banned for what the BBC called “soporific tendencies". Conversely, ‘Deep in the Heart of Texas’ also got the chop because its main clapping motif apparently was encouraging anybody working with a hammer to smash their workbench to bits. The BBC’s plan was to vary the tempo as little as possible, or as the kindly broadcaster put it: “The aim is to produce something which is monotonous and repetitive. Subtlety of any kind is out of place."

Each week I’ll recommend a selection of music while you work. My first suggestion is the work of 16th century songwriter John Dowland. Dowland has a reputation for being rather melancholy, a Morrissey with a lute, but his music remains extremely popular today with recordings by major artists including Alfred Deller, Emma Kirkby and most recently the pop star Sting.

Sting’s new album of Dowland songs, Songs From The Labyrinth, has just been released on Deutsche Grammophon. It’s a marvellous recording and I’d heartily recommend it, especially if you’ve never listened to early music before. His performance of Can She Excuse My Wrongs is particularly good. Before Sunday you can hear an interesting interview and concert he gave at St Luke's in London last week with lute player Edin Karamazov broadcast by the BBC or you can go to DG’s site for some nice clips via their e-player.