Open Pandora’s (Music) Box

If you’re like me, you write better with music playing in the background. I generally opt for music that doesn’t require much of my attention but still serves to get my creative juices flowing. For me, classical, techno, piano, and movie scores typically work best. Music I’ve listened to so much that I have it memorized (like U2 or Union Station) works well, too.

While my iTunes library could play for weeks without repeating, I need some variety to get me moving sometimes. That’s why discovering Pandora was a revelation.

Their stable of “musician-analysts” have taken their musical expertise and created an endless catalog of “if you like this artist, I bet you’ll love this song from this similar artist” choices. You enter artists you like and Pandora’s engine creates “stations” for each.

Each station contains music they think matches the style of the artist you entered. And they are very good at getting this right. Many of the artists are ones I’ve never heard of, which is a brilliant way to broaden people’s musical horizons.

All this, and it’s free. After a few hours of music you’ll need to create a free account to keep listening, but that hardly seems an issue for what you get in return.

Due to the byzantine rules of music copyrights, you don’t get standard song controls like rewind and you can’t go back to the beginning of a song and listen again. If you like a song and want to buy it somewhere later, make a note of it. I’m sure that’s a major part of how Pandora funds itself. It’s great advertising for musicians whose music appears on your stations.

Learn more on their About Pandora page.