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.

Garden office music studios

We've covered many examples of garden offices used as music studios over the years here at Shedworking including Midge Ure's and this rather nice one from Roomworks. The Home Office Company is among those who have built music rooms for clients including Mr Turner, a member of a local jazz quartet and music teacher in Bromley who uses it to teach his students. Here's what they say about the build:

"With neighbours to either side and to the rear of his property, Mr Turner was very sensitive to the potential noise issues that teaching the drums or the saxophone might cause; consequently he spent a great deal of time sourcing just the right structure which would offer space, comfort and most importantly sound insulation. On his visit to our Charing Head Office, Mr Turner went inside the newly constructed Show Office and made ‘one heck of a din’ with his tambourine and saxophone whilst Mrs Turner remained outside to gauge the level of noise that the building allowed to escape."

Pictured top is a Garden Studio music room in Edinburgh from Maison d’etre Properties. Their models include vaulted ceilings and come with additional sound insulation in the form of soundblock wall board or Maxiboard™ acoustic wall board.

Finally, below is an example of a piano in a garden office from Garden Spaces

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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."

White garden office music studio

Black garden offices have been in vogue for some time so maybe it's the turn of white ones next. Here's an example from Modern Garden Rooms who offer bespoke soundproof garden music rooms and garden sound studios, made to specification, and insulated for temperature and sound. Here's what they say about them:

For many, making music is an essential part of life, whether as a career or a much-loved hobby. However, finding a space to practice or play can be a challenge – especially if you live in a crowded neighbourhood. Fortunately, garden music rooms provide the perfect solution. These fully insulated and sound-proofed garden studios offer a peaceful haven where you can make all the noise you want without disturbing your neighbours. Whether you’re a seasoned musician or just starting out, an acoustically treated garden music room is the perfect place to let your creativity flow.

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Barrington Pheloung: shedworker

 

The theme music to the Inspector Morse television series was written by Australian composer Barrington Pheloung (1954 – 2019) who lived and worked in the UK for many years. Pheloung not only wrote the theme tune but all the incidental music too, as he did for the prequel to Morse, Endeavour, and the sequel Lewis. 

And he was also a shedworker. He's pictured above in his garden office and below at work as he talks to Andy Brown, music director of the London Metropolitan Orchestra, in his music studio about how he put together the Morse music.

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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.

Mahler's Heavenly Retreats

In the same vein as Adam Sharr's marvellous monograph Heidegger's Hut, Mahler's Heavenly Retreats is a multimedia exploration of the composer's relationship to the Komponierhäuschen (or huts) where Mahler worked on his music during the summer. Created by architect Keith James Clarke, a specialist in buildings and the character of place, it's a book, a DVD, a web site, and a CD (so he's got pretty much all the bases covered - there's even a special study day on the subject in April next year in London). Keith says his goals are to evaluate key places in Mahler's life, describe the reasons for their importance and demonstrate their associations with his music using archive photos and surveys. Here's what he says about it:

"The production of this book lies in my 30 years working as an architect while indulging a passion for the music of Gustav Mahler. As an architect, I'm filled with unease by much modern architecture — particularly monolithic tower blocks — and drawn to buildings of a more modest scale which, with their surroundings, make more allowance for human aspiration and celebration of life, something that Mahler had in a large quantity.

"Its subtitle is Encounters with the master's composing houses, and is primarily aimed at music lovers and Mahler enthusiasts. Having said that, I think many others will find it a thought-provoking introduction to this great man of music. In particular, readers with an eye for architecture and the environment will find this book of special interest."

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 - 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.

Link between sheds and early British electronic music charted in new book

Devon-based author, musician and shedworker Mark Brend has a new book out today about early electronic music called The Sound of Tomorrow. Of particular interest to Shedworking's readers will be the role that sheds played in early British electronic music. Tristram Cary, the first British composer to experiment with electronic music, worked in a corrugated iron shed/studio in Fressingfield, Suffolk for many years. In the late 1960s he formed EMS, which produced the first British synthesizers, with Peter Zinovieff. Zinovieff too was a shedworker, operating a garden studio in Putney which backed onto the river. Click the video below from British Pathé to see Peter Zinovieff walk to his shed at the bottom of the garden, go inside and reveal his shedworking setup...
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Teaching music in a garden office

Garden2office is just completing a 6x3m music teaching studio in Hampshire. The building comes with acoustically-damped flooring and one wall will be decorated with a collage of sheet music to inspire and entertain the local children who will be attending lessons. Swedish triple-glazed tilt-and-turn windows were chosen to allow in light and keep in the sound of music, while the thermowood cladding goes nicely with the wooded surroundings.
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Shed music

We covered the launch of Devon-based writer, musician and shedworker Mark Brend's debut novel, Undercliff, earlier this year (see details here) and there is now a release date for the accompanying music which was written and recorded in the three separate sheds of three-piece band Fariña, made up of Mark, his former Palace of Light/Mabel Joy bandmate Matt Gale, and drummer/horn player Cliff Glanfield. Here's what Mark says about it:

"The book was almost entirely written in my 10 by 8 insulated, double-glazed shed," says Mark. "It was built about 10 years ago for £5k, and is maturing nicely. As well as serving as my writing room, office and retreat it’s also my recording studio. The Undercliff music was written and recorded here, and also at Matt’s and Cliff’s sheds. We worked separately, swopped files and then convened at Matt’s a few times to put it all together."



The Undercliff Suite EP (HPR 044) will be a limited edition cassette tape/DL/digital release on 24 October comprising five short instrumental pieces composed as incidental music for Undercliff.
Originally active until 2005, Fariña released two acclaimed albums on the Picked Egg label and the Undercliff Suite is their first release since reconvening in 2018.
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Shedworker Peter Zinovieff and the birth of electronic music

We've talked before on Shedworking about the part shedworkers played in the earliest days of electronic music, especially Peter Zinovieff whose garden studio in Putney backed onto the river. Here's a newly-released video from the BBC which shows him at work and takes a brief look at the state of electronic music today and in the future. As they put it: "Peter Zinovieff was the first person to use computers to compose music - which he did from a shed at the bottom of his garden"

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Music studio with stage

A marvellous garden office music teaching studio with additional performance space in Newcastle, Australia, by m3architecture.This is what they say about it:

We took inspiration from a method of teaching, founded in Finland. When considering Finland and music, we couldn’t help but think of architect Alvar Aalto and Finlandia Hall. This precedent provided a glimmer of a studio – a light filled space, with timber stage, white backdrop and blue audience zones compressed into a small studio. The design creates a unique backyard pedagogy – a spatial environment that enables students to drift in and out of practice and performance. The duality of the concept hybridises two worlds – the high architecture of a public building, and the DIY approach of a backyard.

 

Photographs:  Brett Boardman

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Garden office art

It's always a pleasure to come across new garden office art and particularly pleasing in this case since artist and musician Darren Hayman's atmospheric work is of the garden office of friend of Shedworking, author and musician Mark Brend. You can see more of Darren's art at his Etsy shop.

I'd also recommend Darren's music. Below is the lovely Music to Watch News By.

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Soundproof garden music studio

West Sussex-based Miniature Manors covers Sussex,  Surrey and Kent, providing garden offices such as this music studio for a disc jockey in Portsmouth. "By using a specialised insulation and adding clever spacing between the internal and external walls, our garden studios keep escaping sound to an absolute minimum," they say.

This client wanted a soundproof space for making music and preparing mixes as well as storage for his musical equipment. The spec was 3m x 3m, soundproof to approximately 80 decibels, with concrete base walls, and floor and ceiling fully double-insulated with sound insulation. The whole thing is clad with treated redwood shiplap with a flat EPDM rubber roof. The guttering was connected to a water butt. -------------------------------------------------
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Garden office studio for music producer

The first of two music-related garden office builds (the next one tomorrow), here is one for a music producer Alan by eDEN Garden Rooms. In fact it's the second one Alan has bought from eDEN - he bought his first in 2013 but then moved house some years later.

This second one with bifold doors and integrated shed store is 4.35m x 3m and as well as the normal office elements such as a desk, it is also home to various instruments including a keyboard and drum kit.  

“If we moved again, we would certainly need another garden office," said Alan. "It’s difficult to imagine life without it. I consider it to be an investment over the years, and it has paid for itself when you compare it to renting the equivalent space, with the added convenience of it being at home.”

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Thursday posts are sponsored by Cabin Master: garden offices and studios to fit any size garden. Top quality contemporary or traditional buildings. 

 

Shed champion - Charles Hazlewood

Musician, conductor and broadcaster Charles Hazlewood (his Radio 3 series Discovering Music is particularly marvellous) is also a proud shedworker. As revealed in a piece by Will Hodgkinson in The Guardian:

"Hazlewood's office, an old caravan inside a former cattleshed, is filled with messy piles of sheet music, albums and CDs, as well as wonky family photographs. A sign says: "Symphony in Morris Minor." Despite presenting regular shows on Radios 2 and 3 and various TV documentaries on how music works (plus holding down a day job as a touring conductor), Hazlewood doesn't have email. In fact, he doesn't even use a computer."

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."