Reading Music

On the New York Times books blog I recently came across their 'Living with Music' series, where authors provide playlists for their works - songs which either evoke their stories or inspired their writing. This got me thinking - how can music enhance or change our reading experience? The idea of soundtracks for books isn't a new one - in 2006 James Patterson produced 100,000 copies of a CD to accompany one of his 'Maximum Ride' titles. But, in 2010 advanced e-book technology offers new opportunities for combining literary and audio experiences. Publishing as a genre is increasingly influenced by other forms of media, and readers are adapting to new ways of reading - could music become a part of our reading practices? And how much can music add to the reading experience?

The 'Living with Music' feature which caught my eye on the NYT books blog was a piece in which Tatjana Soli gives a playlist for her new novel, 'The Lotus Eaters'. This novel follows a female photojournalist during and after the Vietnam War, as she experiences the horror and chaos of war and is torn between her love for two men. Soli uses music to get into the mood when revising scenes in her novels. Her playlist is the 'soundtrack for the emotional landscape' of the novel, featuring Mamas and Papas, Aaron Neville, Jefferson Airplane, Rolling Stones and classical Vietnamese music by Nguyen Thanh Thuy. This soundtrack is a mix of Sixties rock, drugs and seduction, powerful anti-war songs and otherwordly classical music providing 'an opening into another culture'. Without having read the novel, I feel like listening to these songs tells me a lot about the mood and atmosphere of the story - the playlist is an interesting way of conveying key aspects of the novel to prospective readers.

Christoffer Karlsson, the author of 'The Case of Vincent Franke', which I mentioned in my post on new Swedish crime writing, has provided a playlist for his debut novel which can be accessed via Spotify. He provides a song for each chapter and suggests combining reading each chapter with the relevant song. His playlist features, among others, PJ Harvey, Imogen Heap, Placebo, Bloc Party, Nancy Sinatra, Rage Against the Machine, Radiohead, Regina Spektor and Bruce Springsteen. While mixed, it does convey a sense of the drug riddled underworld of crime and melancholy Karlsson describes in this novel. To me, this shows that Spotify is another way for authors to engage more directly with their readers - as Facebook and Twitter have allowed, and it's interesting and fun for readers to see what music authors would pair with their stories.

I couldn't resist checking out the playlists which Stephanie Myer has produced for her Twilight series - apparently this is the music she hears in her head when reading the books. Overall, these playlists are what you'd expect - brimming over with indie/rock teen angst and drippy love songs. Predominantly featured are Muse, Linkin Park, Travis, Coldpay, Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails, David Gray (gah!), Evanesence, Placebo, Keane... While I enjoyed the Twilight novels (all except Breaking Dawn), I could not submit myself to listen to these lists. The only light relief comes, somewhat inexplicably, with they entry of I'm Too Sexy by Right Said Fred... I can only imagine that this is what plays in Meyer's head when she imagines Jacob entering a room... what a perve.

More seriously, the clearest and most innovative example I have found of the marriage of the physical book and digital audio content is Crooked by Kristin Hersh, to be published by the Friday Project in June 2010. Kristin founded the influential early '90s Boston post-punk band Throwing Muses when 14 years old, and is releasing her next solo album as a book. She says:

After building the record in public at CASH Music as a truly collaborative project with my listeners, I couldn't bear the thought of releasing just another disposable, dead, plastic CD. I wanted to create a key to a living world: this blooming, tangible object, the Crooked book.

The book will contain beautiful artwork, lyrics, essays on each song, and aims to be a beautiful physical object which fans will treasure. It comes with a digital code giving access to online content, including: the album, track by track audio commentray, recording stems, exclusive video content, out-takes and a fan forum. Crooked completely rejects the traditional album format, and reverses the shift from physical book to digital content which is taking place within the publishing industry. If it helps to keep people buying books and treasuring them, I'm all for it!

Enhanced e-books offer many new opportunites for combining music with the reading experience - however this does not seem to have been very fully developed as of yet. One of the few e-books to combine music with literature is The Death of Bunny Munro by Nick Cave, produced by Enhanced Editions. Now, obviously Nick Cave is a MUSICIAN, so it is not surprising that music should be included in his e-book... The enhanced edition included an original soundtrack to the novel by Nick Cave, and full audiobook read by him, as well as videos of him reading the novel. The fact that none of Enhanced Editions' other e-book apps for the iPhone, such as Wolf Hall, or Philip Pullman's new novel,  make use of music suggest that they think soundtracks or playlists would not significantly add to the reading experience in themselves. Yet it is interesting to consider the possibilites that technology and these apps for iPhone offer - after all the iPhone is the descendent of the iPod, a device for listening to music.

I'm sceptical that music will become integral to our reading practices. Playlists and soundtracks for books are interesting for the reader and offer more ways for authors to engage with readers. But, I think there are probably many readers like me who would find it better to keep their passions for music and books seperate. But, I enjoyed reading authors' playlists, and I do think music can certainly help to evoke time and place and spark the imagination - possibly more quickly than words alone can.