Conversations with a Restless Library

I don’t curate.
I don’t pre-select.
I don’t build productivity playlists.

I just hit shuffle on my entire music library and wait to see what sort of mood it’s in.

Some days, it’s a model colleague — thoughtful, supportive, gently nudging me into creative flow.
Other days, it behaves like a caffeinated record-store assistant with a point to prove.

Take this afternoon.

I sit down to work, and the playlist begins with R.E.M.’s Country Feedback — raw, unfiltered, emotionally scuffed around the edges. It’s a promising start. Then, without transition or apology, it glides into the Australian Chamber Orchestra performing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D Major. The Larghetto, no less. And I think, “Richard Tognetti, you magician.” My shoulders drop. My typing slows. I breathe.

But before I get too relaxed, Tina Arena arrives, singing Tu aurais dû me dire, like she’s stepped straight out of a smoky Paris café. She hands the mic to Paul Simon (who simply whispers Love), before making way for a live version of Fleetwood Mac’s Over and Over — all rich harmonies and road-tested soul.

Then, just when I think I know where this is going, Lyle Lovett pulls up a chair.

If I Were the Man You Wanted, he drawls, sounding both mournful and amused, like a cowboy philosopher who’s been stood up at the dance but still has good stories to tell. I smile. He always sneaks in when I need a break from taking things too seriously.

Later, Birdy aches her way through Save Yourself, followed by Peter Gabriel summoning ghosts with Come Talk to Me. Then the cello returns — Yo-Yo Ma and Kathryn Stott, drawing out the aching grace of The Swan.
Madeleine Peyroux offers This Is Heaven To Me, and I almost believe her.
Then Joseph Tawadros bursts in with Rose, oud in hand, like colour returning to a black-and-white film.
Finally, Corelli’s Concerto Grosso brings it all back to centre — poised, measured, quietly defiant.

All that in the time it took me to write this.

My library is a time capsule disguised as a companion — decades of favourites, sorted by artist, era, geography (Australia gets its own wing), and instinct. Classical gets special treatment.

But at home, at work, I hand the reins to shuffle.
It’s unpredictable. It’s deeply personal. It’s mildly chaotic.
But then again, so is Lyle Lovett.

And it works for me.