Music to work to

These are a few ideas for finding good music to work to from a personal point of view, the list will show my age and perhaps my personality. The sort of work you are doing alters the best music that will suit as an accompaniment to life. When I am reading in order to study or memorise I need a quiet, complex style, I find this actively helps me to concentrate and remember; to learn and understand it is essential to relax, giving a state of mindful alertness not troubled by extraneous, irrelevant thoughts. This state of being relaxed, untroubled but giving full concentration is necessary in a lot of sports and careers as well, it is not always easy to conjure up, particularly when motivation is either too high or too low or distractions too dominant. Music can tell you how to do it. I like various musicians in all genres from pop, rock and roll to jazz and classical, but not all at the same time! Considering quiet concentration then I find classical chamber music, solo pieces or quiet reflective jazz suits me best. I will start with some jazz suggestions; Just a list of names,[it all depends on what is available so I do not want to go into much detail about individual pieces or records, just try them and see]; Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Coleman Hawkins, Duke Ellington, Johnny Hodges, Claude Hopkins, Buddy Tate, Joe Thomas[these last three on a wonderful old vinyl called ‘Let’s Jam’] Errol Garner, Thelonious Monk, Oscar Peterson, Charlie Parker, Tubby Hayes.........; there are lots of contemporary jazz musicians to explore as well. Coming to Classical music there is one, must have, record as a starter to a contemplative collection, this is J.S. Bach’s solo cello suites, all the top cellists get this on record so get yourself more than one, they are all a little different. To my mind Bach’s solo and chamber music often has the natural beauty of mathematics and the nature of the universe within its patterns of sound. I particularly recommend solo piano music as brain food, in forms such as the sonata; Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, Chopin alone provide a wealth of study. Chopin called his solo pieces by various names, having meaning to experts, such as Etudes, Nocturnes etc, I have yet to discover any thing he composed which was not beautiful and lucid. I can still remember first listening to the late Beethoven string quartets and his late piano sonatas when I was studying medecine at he age of nineteen. There are very many string quartets, sometimes with inclusion of piano, clarinet etc as a quintet, lots of them feed the brain and set it moving in the right direction. Another genre to try is church music, English composers such as; Thomas Tallis, William Byrd, Henry Purcell and Vaughan Williams all have wonderful contemplative music to their names. If something with a little more force is needed then try concertos,[piano, violin, clarinet et]c by all the great composers.