Tuesday, February 20, 2007

It just takes a little Mozart...

...for me to find focus. One of the first CDs I ever bought was a recording of the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 26 in D-Major performed by Murray Perahia. This is the CD I'd put in whenever I was in crunch paper-writing time in college, graduate school the first time, and now graduate school the second time (TEN years later...ugh, age, where are my cane and vitamins?). Why I don't remember to put this CD in every morning, I'll never know. I always focus and get a lot of work done when I hear this piece. It's benign enough that I don't just space out and listen to the music. It helps me filter out the rest of the world and do nothing but write. There are three movements: faster, slower, and fast (my translation of the Italian). During the fast movements I write, and during the slow movement I read and proof. I don't mean to do it that way, but that's just the rhythm I've established. I think it's subconscious. Many times I just put the CD on repeat mode and so I can crank through a big paper.

Guess I'm going to have this tune running perpetually here in my office for the next couple of weeks. I've just burned the CD to my office computer.

2 comments:

lemming said...

The soundtrack to Sunday in the Park with George - I know exactly what you mean.

Adrian Hermann said...

I also know what you mean... Soundtrack to The Straight Story. I can work wonderfully while listening to that.