This month I thought I’d share some music playlists with you  that I love.

Remember when you could make a mixed tape with all your favorite songs on it and give it to a friend? I loved those tapes!  

Simply click on the link below then click on the picture that appears beside the name of the playlist and enjoy!

1. Yoga Chill mix one.  This playlist contains a lot of relaxing music, some ambient music and much of the music I play sometimes in class.

1. Dance Dinah Dance.  This is one I created for my pal Dinah because we both like to dance – it contains a lot current music – may not be suitable for everyone 🙂

1. Born in the Wrong Era. Not created by me “Some old classic 60’s and 70’s songs loved by a 90’s kid.”  

You can still make a mixed CD for a friend, but in order to share with many people, Spotify or 8 Tracks is the way to go. If you want a little more background – let me introduce some of the ways music is being consumed and shared these days. Things in this area have moved quickly in the last few years and it can be confusing to understand the music sharing services out there. Luckily I have teenagers to help 🙂

While you can still buy a CD or buy a digital download of a song from iTunes or elsewhere, it takes time to build a playlist that you want to listen to. It is also is tough to discover new music you might be interested in.  I am going to talk about two different internet music sites (although there are many many more) One is called Spotify and one is called 8 Tracks.

Spotify is what is considered “on-demand” music streaming service. You pick a specific song, album or artist, hit play, listen to that specific selection on demand, whenever and as often as desired. It has a free option (you will get commercials) or the ‘premium’ option which costs a little over $10 a month. Spotify has a huge collection of songs and when you have the premium option you can download a song and play it even if you do not have an internet connection. You don’t really ‘own’ the song, unlike buying it from iTunes, but it is handy when you don’t have internet.  My kids have Spotify and they do love it.

8 Tracks is what is referred to as ‘internet radio’. It is also a membership site (with a free version and a paid subscription option) Instead of picking a specific song, you can choose an artist or genre or even mood by typing it into the search box and clicking on the tabs that come up. There are then many playlists (all made by real people) that come up for you to listen to. Each playlist contains at least eight tracks (hence the name) but many contain more. If you are listening to a playlist, you can not change the order and if you want to skip a song, you can only do that three times before it asks you to move along to another playlist. So its like listening to the radio, you have less control over the exact song but you are exposed to songs within a certain theme you might never hear otherwise. The restrictions apply because of the licensing agreements these companies have worked out with the artists. If you like a song you hear on 8 Tracks, you can usually buy it on iTunes for your own personal library, unless it is kind of obscure. Oh – and you need an internet connection to listen to 8 Tracks. I personally love 8 Tracks and have decided to make my playlists on this platform as well subscribing to it – about $5 a month for ad free access. I like it because I discover music I like for ‘free’ and I would not know what to search on Spotify. Make no mistake though – its a young person’s world on 8 tracks although I have included an ‘oldies’ playlist in my three favorites.

Enjoy! 

PS – if you want to know more about how to use 8 tracks – let me know in the comments below and I can expand this post.