Work music

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I appear to have started something - ignition perhaps, but better than being Unfinished.

[Richard Barrett]

IMO listening is not just one thing which you either can or can't do do while doing something else. There are many different modes of listening which are also sometimes not so very clearly delineated from one another. I like to listen to music while working, as long as I'm working on something that doesn't actually require "thinking in sound", like typesetting or calculating or the like, which often occupy more time than the actual "inspiration" stuff, much of which anyway takes place away from the desk. It's a different kind of thing from "really listening". Sometimes I find (if it's familiar music) that some favourite passage goes by without my consciously noticing it. At other times my attention is grabbed and the work stops!

[MrGongGong]

IMO listening is not just one thing which you either can or can't do do while doing something else. There are many different modes of listening which are also sometimes not so very clearly delineated from one another. I like to listen to music while working, as long as I'm working on something that doesn't actually require "thinking in sound", like typesetting or calculating or the like, which often occupy more time than the actual "inspiration" stuff, much of which anyway takes place away from the desk. It's a different kind of thing from "really listening". Sometimes I find (if it's familiar music) that some favourite passage goes by without my consciously noticing it. At other times my attention is grabbed and the work stops!

Do you listen to music that is in similar soundworlds to that you create?
When i'm listening to music in that way it is usually far away from the music I make myself.

[Richard Barrett]

Do you listen to music that is in similar soundworlds to that you create?

Sometimes, not particularly often.

[ahinton]

...but hopefully not also when Stallin'. Still, no one need ask him to Popov just becasue of that...

[Constantbee]

Reminds me of a lively conversation on a music forum in a previous online incarnation. The question was: What would happen if you asked your dentist to change to your favourite radio station during your treatment? Reactions from forumites were surprisingly favourable. A few tried and some dentists did change on request. I've never tried asking because I can imagine the blank looks I'd get if I did. Anybody got a dentist who listens to a classical station in the treatment room?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I can't remember ever going to a dentist who had Music on in the treatment room - perhaps that's an advantage of being on the NHS? (Thinking about it, none at Reception or the Waiting Rooms, either. Radio2 in the GPs' and Hospital Waiting areas (usually Ken Bruce).

[Richard Barrett]

I can't remember ever going to a dentist who had Music on in the treatment room - perhaps that's an advantage of being on the NHS? (Thinking about it, none at Reception or the Waiting Rooms, either. Radio2 in the GPs' and Hospital Waiting areas (usually Ken Bruce).

My dentist always has music on in the treatment room, some kind of 70s-80s pop station which is bearable enough (I've been four times in the last three weeks), I'm not sure I'd like to ask him to put on music I'd prefer, I don't want to start having involuntary associations between his drill and some music I previously loved!

[Richard Tarleton]

Russell Braddon's biog of Joan Sutherland relates how, when she was having prolonged dental work early in her career, her dentist played Maria Callas records......

[doversoul1]

Reminds me of a lively conversation on a music forum in a previous online incarnation. The question was: What would happen if you asked your dentist to change to your favourite radio station during your treatment? Reactions from forumites were surprisingly favourable. A few tried and some dentists did change on request. I've never tried asking because I can imagine the blank looks I'd get if I did. Anybody got a dentist who listens to a classical station in the treatment room?

My old dentist had Radio 3 on in his treatment room. I never asked if he liked the music or if there was any ‘strategy’ behind it. It was quite pleasant to be hearing very agreeable music and often a familiar voice while I had my teeth cleaned. And no, he wasn’t a NHS dentist He was when we started going to him but turned private when there was some changes in the regulation or something of that sort. He retired a few years ago and the new one seems happy to let any pop music streaming while he works.

[Dave2002]

I can't remember ever going to a dentist who had Music on in the treatment room - perhaps that's an advantage of being on the NHS? (Thinking about it, none at Reception or the Waiting Rooms, either. Radio2 in the GPs' and Hospital Waiting areas (usually Ken Bruce).

Remind me never to go to your GP, or hospitals in your area! Is that a new strategy to reduce attendance for treatment?

Vauxhall tube station used to have some very pleasant music - or at least to me. I was surprised. Maybe it still does. Then someone told me it was on to deter all the young people who apparently either don't like that stuff, or don't want to admit it (which is not quite the same thing). Allegedly it was successful, and presumably considered less cruel than the high frequency noises which have been tried in some areas which tends to clear the spaces of anyone who can still hear above 16 kHz. Of course being young isn't necessarily a bad thing, but some authorities don't like gangs etc. of people of certain ages congregating, so everyone in those ranges gets tarred with the same brush.

[Serial_Apologist]

My dentist always has music on in the treatment room, some kind of 70s-80s pop station which is bearable enough (I've been four times in the last three weeks), I'm not sure I'd like to ask him to put on music I'd prefer, I don't want to start having involuntary associations between his drill and some music I previously loved!

I think if I asked my dentist if she could change the station, she would probably say the knob was permanently stuck on Radio 2!

[ahinton]

I think if I asked my dentist if she could change the station, she would probably say the knob was permanently stuck on Radio 2!

I'm sure that you could think of a suitably dusty retort to that!

[Serial_Apologist]

Remind me never to go to your GP, or hospitals in your area! Is that a new strategy to reduce attendance for treatment?

Vauxhall tube station used to have some very pleasant music - or at least to me. I was surprised. Maybe it still does. Then someone told me it was on to deter all the young people who apparently either don't like that stuff, or don't want to admit it (which is not quite the same thing). Allegedly it was successful, and presumably considered less cruel than the high frequency noises which have been tried in some areas which tends to clear the spaces of anyone who can still hear above 16 kHz. Of course being young isn't necessarily a bad thing, but some authorities don't like gangs etc. of people of certain ages congregating, so everyone in those ranges gets tarred with the same brush.

This policy still operates at Brixton, though not that I would ever notice at rush hour. As you can probably imagine, various earth-shaking beatboxes leisurely parade their way past the station entrance with added aromas of skunkish pungency in the perennially slow-moving traffic at that point.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

My last 5 dentists have imposed music/Muzak on me. The second of these was a fanatical electronic music fan, and talked to me about it constantly as he worked on my teeth. I didn't like to complain, because I taught his son at school at the time. At least his sound system was good, which is more than can be said for the others.