Working through a number of things on how music2work2 relates to Kilted Chaos and how best to wor with all of that.
Viewing entries in
Reviews
If you watched the Julian Treasure video on the power of sound, you’ll already know why listening to birdsong has a calming affect on us humans. But I bet you didn’t know that there is an Internet Radio station that plays bird song 24/7!
powered by birdsong radio
The thinking goes that over the years humans have learned to relax when birds are singing – it’s when the birds stop singing that we need to worry. I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently and was about to start a piece of music that incorporated bird song along with a few other tricks when Charlotte discovered Birdsong Radio. I couldn’t help but laugh on reading her write up:
Recently I have been listening to Internet Radio stations, looking for ones that play music that would be categorizable as music2work2. Even though I listen for quite a while to get a good feel for the music they play, it seems that very few only play instrumental music.
I have also found that the name of a station or particular program does not necessarily indicate the type of music they play, except for that is, Birdsong Radio; I discovered that "bird songs," the sound of birds singing, is the only thing they play. I really appreciate nature and animals & I love to sit on the porch, relax and listen to the birds chirping and singing in my yard. But after a while, listening to only bird sounds directly through the radio starts to become annoying. Julian reckons there is no maximum dose but to my ears it became an irritation and I had the change the channel.
I’ve been listening to Birdsong radio while I write this post and found it to be a great accompaniment, but I guess I can see where after a while your brain is looking for a different stimulus. I think like most things in life it’s about balance – I’m certainly going to incorporate some birdsong in the next piece of music2work2 – along with a variation of the New York Jets fight song – but that’s a different kind of science all together.
As Charlotte and I expand our listening habits, it never ceases to amaze me just how much new music there is “out there,” and not just new music, but new and easy ways to listen to it.
I’m listening to a perfect track called Natural Tune by Efterklang – it’s laid back – chilled and perfect stuff to write this post to. Oh and you can listen to it too – go to 22tracks and select the Relax category – right here.
This is brilliant – it’s just like radio – if radio didn’t have the ads and was programmed by music lovers rather than accountants. There are22 different playlists from Contemporary to Latin, Dubstep to Worldgrooves – each area has a curator who selects 22 tracks and you just click and listen. Each track has a link out to the artist’s website and a purchase link – genius.
The more I look at this model the more it makes sense. There’s been much discussion about having an algorithmic approach to music selection – one of my favorite music writers Bruce Warila, is at the forefront of that (to my ears) quixotic charge. For me - I’d much rather have a human being act as my filter; someone who really is passionate about music – who lives and breathes it – who writes about it and works with it and who spends hours of their time listening to and feeling it. I’m not saying that one day the Kurzweilian utopia won’t appear but I’m guessing it’s a while away – until then I’ll let Venz curate my relax music and my hip hop too!