I always create book soundtracks to capture the overall mood I'm going for and listen to them as I write. Those songs and scores really fuse with the scenes in my mind.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The music I listen to while writing is really scene-specific. It's just a great motivator, a way to put myself in the mood.
I always choose music based on whatever the scene calls for, or whatever my mood is supposed to be.
All my books are about one major idea and two or three subsidiary ones. I have thought a lot about music when constructing books, and I like the way in music that themes come back.
Well lately I have listening to a lot of movie soundtracks.
I start with the music before I start writing the movie. It's such an important part for me, emotionally, to set up the tone for the movie.
In the film work, I love to work mainly from the script and from talking to the directors, so a lot of the music, big portions of the scores that I've made, have been composed before the movies were even shot.
The thing is I write to music, so every script I have has its own playlist. Music just opens me up to the emotions that I'm writing. It's just a pretty cool thing.
I sort of enjoy being able to hear what other composers are doing and how they might score something differently than me. I enjoy that part.
Making playlists can kill a whole afternoon for me. I like building very specific playlists for new writing projects. In a strange way, choosing certain songs is part of the process of plotting the book out. I pick songs that I think with resonate with characters, their personality quirks, relationship dynamics, action scenes, and so on.
I don't listen to music when I write, but I do turn on appropriate music when I read portions of my manuscripts back to myself - kind of like adding a soundtrack to help shape mood.