I can write *forever* on this topic. :) I grew up in a musical family and have written to music ever since I was a kid.

My stories have soundtracks. ("Another Place," published in Amazing in May 1988, is named after the track by the Japanese fusion jazz group Hiroshima, because I had it on auto-repeat throughout the entire writing. "Arachne," which was just reprinted in the Riffing on Strings anthology (Scriblerus Press), had John Adams's "Shaker Loops" as its soundtrack.)

My characters have themes. (Maurice Durufle's "Messe Cum Jubilo" for one, the "Largo" movement from Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto #4 for another.)

My scenes have themes. (The battle scene near the end of Covenant (Aisling Press, 2007) was written to Peter Sculthorpe's "Kakadu." And I still remember that the opening scene of "The Trial of Dodi," published in Black Maria in 1981, was written to the opening of Witold Lutoslawski's Concerto for Orchestra.)

"Variations for Four Hands," in Yellow Silk (Spring 1985), is a direct translation of Lutoslawski's Paganini Variations. I have it up on my website at home.earthlink.net/~emalcoh...tion.html

Earlier today I was writing notes for the last book in my series, headphoned into my iPod and listening to Jean-Luc Ponty. Since that music fit the mood, I'll probably use it when I write the scene. Sometimes, when I feel stuck as to which POV to use or what focus to take, I wait until the "right" music starts playing in my head, telling me which character or mood to use. Then I headphone into the music and get going. A few years ago I wrote a fan letter to Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara, whose music fueled the second volume of my series (which will be released later this year) almost in its entirety. He answered, too, which was very cool!

If I didn't use headphones, people would probably kill me. I have a novel draft in the deep freeze, over 100 pages of which I'd written to Michael Torke's 8-minute piece "Slate," set endlessly on auto-repeat.

Recently I discovered music through writing a story. As part of my research for a piece currently in submission, I found Tempo 70's "El Galleton" at
sunoflatinmusic.blogspot.com/200...html

My story begins in 1973 and my protagonist is a Latina, so I wrote part of the story while listening to this tune -- which I also incorporated into the piece.

I like to have music on that suits my writing mood. Often, this means something that can fade away into the background, or has no words, so as not to be distracting. But sometimes, like last night, I like listening to more intense music while writing to really get amped up to work.

Now that I'm writing a screenplay, I'm considering music for certain scenes. It's a lot of fun to think about the soundtrack of my imagined film. I'm enjoying this immensely.