What is the best music to listen to while writing a manuscript or grant proposal? OK, I know that some people prefer silence and certainly most people hate radio chatter while trying to concentrate. However, if you like listening to music, setting an iPod on shuffle is no good since a track by Napalm Death can jump from the speakers and affect your concentration. Here is a strategy for a randomised music stream of the right mood and with no repetition, using iTunes.
For this you need:
A reasonably large and varied iTunes library that is properly tagged*.
1. Setup the first smart playlist to select all songs in your library that you like to listen to while writing. I do this by selecting genres that I find conducive to writing.
Conditions are:
-Match any of the following rules
-Genre contains jazz
-add as many genres as you like, e.g. shoegaze, space rock, dream pop etc.
-Don’t limit and do check live updating
I call this list Writing
2. Setup a second smart playlist that makes a randomised novel list from the first playlist
Conditions are:
-Match all of the following rules
-Playlist is Writing //or whatever you called the 1st playlist
-Last played is not in the last 14 days //this means once the track is played it disappears, i.e. refreshes constantly
-Limit to 50 items selected by random
-Check Live updating
I call this list Writing List
That’s it! Now play from Writing List while you write. The same strategy works for other moods, e.g. for making figures I like to listen to different music and so I have another pair for that.
After a while, the tracks that you’ve skipped (for whatever reason) clog up the playlist. Just select all and delete from the smart playlist, this refreshes the list and you can go again with a fresh set.
* If your library has only a few tracks, or has plenty of tracks but they are all of a similar genre, this tip is not for you.