Tips for Studying to Music in Law School
0L Pre-Law, 1L Students, 2L Students, 3L Students, 4 Graduates, All Articles, Web & Technology Add commentsFor students who like to listen to music while studying, here are some tips for better iTunes listening, free online music, and great new websites that introduce you to new music you will love.
Better Listening by Using iTunes’ Smart Playlists
Many students study while listening to the free music player, iTunes. For those students, the Smart Playlist feature of iTunes is the key to hours of enjoyment without having to interrupt studying to pick a new song.
You can create a Smart Playlist to play only songs that meet a certain criteria (rules specified by you) like “only play music” or “only play songs I like but don’t play the same song too often.”
More advanced users will enjoy playlists that rotate your music like a radio station.or using playlists to remove music you no longer want. For even more ideas, visit www.smartplaylists.com.
Listen to Any Song Online Free
Blogmusik and RadioBlogClub.com have a huge database of popular songs you can play online for free. No special software is needed — they play in your browser.
Find New Music You Like Online Free
Have you ever heard a great song that was never played on the radio? This happens because most radio stations only play what they are paid to play. So how do you discover new music you would enjoy? Introduce yourself to Last.fm and Pandora.com.
Last.fm and Pandora.com are amazing. They help you find other great songs you like. First, you type in the name of a band you like. Then as each plays, you mark whether you like them. Your preferences are used to find other songs you might like, and play those next.
The websites use different technology to find songs you like. Panora suggests songs by the attributes of the music and Last.fm suggests songs by what others with your tastes have enjoyed.
Neither has advertisements. Each has their own group of fans. Also, each play free online music in your browser, so special software is needed.
Mercora
Mercora is another free online music site, but it requires you to download its software, so I didn’t try it.
This is part of a series of articles highlighting Web 2.0 websites for law students.
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December 7th, 2006 at 11:16 pm
I cannot study while listening to music. In college I studied music composition and I think it has ruined me for life. I was trying to figure out why other people could study with music, but I just found it way to distracting and I found a study where they put people in some type of scanner and watched which part of their brains were active during different activities.
When they gave non-musicians an instrument and asked them to play it, they it lit up regions A. When they asked them to listen to music it lit up region B. However, when they put musicians in the scanner and had them listen to music it lit up region A and B.
The idea was that just listening to music for musicians will trigger the same areas of the brain that are required for actually making the motions to play a musical instrument.
The point is that if you’ve had much musical training, you may find music more of a distraction than a help in studying. So don’t assume you can listen to music while studying just because it works for other people.
January 19th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
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