Is music a useful study aid? It’s by no means a given: for every fan of background sound, you’ll find a refusenik who insists on complete silence. The right sort of music, though, really can prove useful in ushering in a calm, contemplative atmosphere that helps even the most fiendish French verb to percolate the brain. Here are some of the greatest works of classical music for studying and keeping you focused on the task at hand without getting distracted...
The best classical music for studying
Bach: Goldberg Variations
‘Bach is best’, runs the old adage, and you could probably tack the phrase ‘…for studying to’ on the end. Much of the great man’s output is excellent for swotting to, with its rigorous internal discipline and precision-tooled structures. But which of his many works to choose? We’ll go for the much-loved Goldberg Variations for piano, reasoning that solo instrumental work – without the attention-grabbing clamour of multiple voices – makes the ideal companion to a long, book-bound evening.
We also named Bach's Goldberg Variations as one of the best Bach works for beginners.
Chopin: Etudes
Clue’s in the name, perhaps? Well, yes and no: Chopin’s Etudes are not so much music to study to (étudier) as actual proper ‘studies’ for pianists to hone their skills on. However, they also make a fine sonic backdrop to a long session with, say, complex cell structures or the imports and exports of Argentina.
There’s something about those nimble, keyboard-spanning arpeggios, as heard in Op. 10 No. 1 or Op. 25 No.11, that shakes off the cerebral cobwebs and gets the brain fired up for action – the aural equivalent of a double espresso shot, if you like.
Debussy: Images
More solo pianism: this time, though, from the more serene end of the spectrum. Debussy’s six Images are glorious examples of musical scene-painting, depicting (among others) the play of sunlight on water and the sound of church bells through the trees. This is music at its most gently contemplative, ushering in a mood of receptive quietism.
We named Debussy's Images as one of the best pieces of Debussy music for beginners.
We name the best recordings of Debussy's Images here.
Philip Glass: Music in Twelve Parts
Philip Glass’s music, concentrating as it does on repetition and slow build-up of drama and narrative, can make for a perfect study soundtrack. There are many options, but we’ll suggest Music in Twelve Parts – and not just because this monumental, 12-movement work clocks in at around four hours, so you won’t get those jarring gear changes every few minutes as your music player seeks something ‘similar’.
This is the piece in which Glass’s musical signatures – minimalist soundscapes, slow but inexorable momentum, almost imperceptible changes in the musical argument – are heard most eloquently. It all plays off as one immense intellectual exercise in sonic, motivic possibility.
Bruckner: Symphony No. 5
If we’re talking about music that builds its drama steadily and inexorably, Bruckner’s monumental, slow-burn symphonies are fine examples. The Fifth’s gradual accretion of tension, and the vast sonic edifices it crafts so imperturbably, are highly satisfying on both an emotional and an intellectual plane.
We name the best recordings of Bruckner's Symphony No. 5 here. And here's a ranking of all nine numbered Bruckner symphonies.
Ludovico Einaudi: Le Onde (The Waves)
If it’s meditative, evenly paced music that you’re after, few composers come more highly recommended than Ludovico Einaudi. Cohesion, simplicity and optimism are the prevailing moods in the Italian’s music: all fine accompaniments to an afternoon of calm, focused study.
- Ludovico Einaudi's top 5 albums
- Why does Einaudi struggle to find acceptance in the classical music world?
Beethoven: Diabelli Variations
There’s something intellectually satisfying about the theme-and-variations form. A theme is laid out, and then worked on methodically and painstakingly – mined for possible combinations, alternate modes of expression. There are many theme-and-variations examples, but as an aid to creative thinking Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations works a treat.
Beethoven takes a simple waltz by the 19th-century composer Anton Diabelli, then proceeds to harvest it for no fewer than 33 interpretations, each one as ingenious and satisfying as its neighbours. The miracle here is how Beethoven seizes upon some of the waltz’s simplest patterns and motifs, and from these basic kernels constructs music of huge imagination and ingenuity. Any Diabelli-inspired study session should find you in similarly fertile form.
We included the Diabelli Variations in our list of the best Beethoven works.
Recomposed by Max Richter: Vivaldi – The Four Seasons
Listening to Max Richter’s 2012 reimagining of Vivaldi’s much-loved The Four Seasons is a hugely satisfying experience. Richter borrows, adds, reinvents and transposes irresistibly, so that an oh-so-familiar masterpiece is both comfortingly present and also strangely, thrillingly renewed.
This is music that will float by unobtrusively – yet also suggest myriad new sonic (and, we’d bet, intellectual) possibilities. Sometimes having tunes while we're working can be distracting, so this is a great piece of classical music for studying because it's similar... yet different.
- What is post-classical music?
- Einaudi, Richter, Sakamoto: 18 definitive ambient classical albums you should hear
Vaughan Williams: Tuba Concerto
OK, the science bit. Studies of brain activity in different sound environments have demonstrated that a sonic frequency of 40Hz is particularly beneficial to mental performance. And, for the even-more-science bit, this is probably because our brain cells themselves communicate at that self-same 40Hz – sound at this frequency appears to produce unusually high levels of cognition, clarity and alertness.
But what sort of music is actually played at 40Hz? Well, the tuba and double bass are among the only instruments to get down this low (elsewhere, the bassoon spans down to 60Hz, while the violin bottoms out at around 200Hz).
Casting around for pieces for these instruments, we come first to Vaughan Williams’s Tuba Concerto. Written two years before his Eighth Symphony, the work inhabits a similarly playful soundworld. Come for the brain-enhancing low notes; stay for the wonderful music.
Prokofiev: Symphony No. 1
Not all study sessions need to be soundtracked with peaceful melodies. Yes, such patient, evenly paced music may be just the thing for a session on calculus or the valencies of various chemical elements. But what about those more emotionally involving tasks? Rounding off a piece of creative writing, for example, or building to the final, doubt-shattering climax of a thesis?
In this case, something more rousing may be a better fit. And music doesn’t come much more exhilarating than Prokofiev’s ‘Classical’ Symphony. Essentially 20 minutes of symphonic high spirits, the ‘Classical’ is jampacked with uplifting melodies, while the final movement will have you grinning with joy as you put the finishing touches to your own magnum opus. A perfect piece of classical music for studying.
Webern: Six Pieces for Orchestra
Composers are, in general, an intelligent bunch – the kind of mental rigour and compartmentalisation required to orchestrate a symphony, say, is not given to us all. But even in such company, Anton Webern stands out. The Austrian pioneer of 12-tone music, or Serialism, wrote music of impressive sophistication and complexity, and studied for a PhD in musicology.
We’re hoping that some of that intellect rubs off on you every time you sit down to study with his music in the background. For a gentle start, though, go with one of his shorter and comparatively accessible pieces – the atmospheric Six Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6, from 1909.
Mozart: Symphony No. 41
If we’re talking clever composers, Mozart – thought to have an IQ of around 150-155, safely in ‘genius’ territory – definitely needs a mention. Like Bach’s before it, Mozart’s music testifies to a supremely organised and sophisticated mind, able to coordinate several different patterns or musical arguments at a time.
This is nowhere more evident than in the astonishing final movement of his last symphony, the ‘Jupiter’ No. 41. This tour-de-force of classical choreography is a fugue containing no fewer than five voices, all wrapping around each other seamlessly and, increasingly, joyously.
This is clearly the product of a brilliant mind. And there’s surely a chance that some of that dazzling intellect and machine-tooled precision will rub off as you pore over those thermal physics textbooks. Mozart truly does make you smarter – so use this masterpiece of classical music for studying and see how your grades improve.
We named the 'Jupiter' Symphony as one of the best works by Mozart.
Missy Mazzoli: These Worlds in Us
There’s a sort of cosmic serenity to These Worlds in Us, a short 2006 orchestral piece by the New York-based composer Missy Mazzoli. In particular, its rhythmic patterns and cyclical structure are inspired by Balinese music, which has its own particular tension and inexorable logic. Calm with a sense of wonder: the perfect study soundtrack, as well as being unusually beautiful and atmospheric in its own right.
Anything by Hildegard von Bingen
We’ve maintained a strict no-vocals policy thus far, but we’ll relax that rule to allow in some of the beatific sounds of the 12th-century abbess and polymath Hildegard von Bingen. The combination of heavenly voices floating over a Medieval fiddle drone or harp makes for a suitably serene backdrop, allowing the mind to zone in on the task at hand. Canticles of Ecstasy, the 1993 release from the early music ensemble Sequentia, makes an excellent introduction to the work of the (literally) visionary abbess.
Cage: 4'33"
Silence in the library, please! If the very idea of music for studying is anathema to you, we’ve got you covered too – thanks to John Cage's 4'33". The ever-adventurous Cage wrote this legendarily noteless minimalist composition in 1952. The sound of silence indeed.
