Music is my only drug

there's nothing like music to relieve the soul and uplift it

Songs I keep coming back to

Hey Jude THE BEATLES · 1968 33⅓

now spinning

Hey Jude

The Beatles · 1968

listen

↓ pull a record from the crate

headphones on · all night · every night

On Repeat

हिंदी stage

Arijit Singh Mohammed Rafi & the golden-era classics Jubin Nautiyal

rock & pop stage

The Beatles
Linkin Park Imagine Dragons Post Malone

admit one · no skips

play something

or tap the keys · A–L on a keyboard

piano pieces I love

Video thumbnail: Mariage d'Amour piano performance Mariage d'Amour Paul de Senneville, not Chopin! Video thumbnail: Für Elise piano performance Für Elise Beethoven, the real one Video thumbnail: Love Story theme on piano Love Story Francis Lai, not Beethoven! Video thumbnail: virtuosic Harry Potter piano medley Harry Potter medley John Williams, ten fingers, pure magic

on my wall

Portrait of Johann Sebastian Bach with his quote: The aim and final end of all music should be none other than the glory of God and the refreshment of the soul. Bach Portrait of Ludwig van Beethoven with the quote: Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. Beethoven Portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart with a quote attributed to him: All I insist on, and nothing else, is that you should show the whole world that you are not afraid. Be silent, if you choose; but when it is necessary, speak, and speak in such a way that people will remember it. Mozart Painting of a woman in a white dress playing the piano, in bright orange and yellow brushstrokes
liner notes

In short: my playlist swings between Hindi film music (Mohammed Rafi and the golden-era classics, Arijit Singh, Jubin Nautiyal) and Western rock and pop (The Beatles, Linkin Park, Imagine Dragons, Post Malone). The songs I return to most are Blowin’ in the Wind, Tu Hi Re, I Believe I Can Fly, Hey Jude and Imagine.

The five records in the crate

Song Artist Year From
Blowin’ in the Wind Bob Dylan 1963 The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan
Tu Hi Re Hariharan and Kavita Krishnamurthy; music by A. R. Rahman 1995 Bombay (Hindi version of Uyire Uyire)
I Believe I Can Fly R. Kelly 1996 Space Jam soundtrack
Hey Jude The Beatles (written by Paul McCartney) 1968 single, over seven minutes long
Imagine John Lennon 1971 Imagine

The lineup. Mohammed Rafi (1924–1980) was the voice of Hindi cinema’s golden era. Arijit Singh became the defining playback voice of the last decade after Tum Hi Ho (Aashiqui 2, 2013). Jubin Nautiyal, from Uttarakhand, sang Raataan Lambiyan (Shershaah, 2021). The Beatles were John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, from Liverpool, 1960–1970. Linkin Park broke through with Hybrid Theory (2000), home of In the End. Imagine Dragons are the Las Vegas band behind Radioactive, Demons and Believer. Post Malone’s hits include Circles, Sunflower and Rockstar.

The piano pieces. Mariage d’Amour is often mislabelled online as Chopin; Paul de Senneville wrote it in 1978 and Richard Clayderman made it famous. Für Elise is Beethoven’s. The Love Story theme is Francis Lai’s, from the 1970 film, in Richard Clayderman’s arrangement (the video credits Beethoven, but it isn’t his). The Harry Potter medley is a virtuosic cover of John Williams’s themes by Eshan Denipitiya.

The background radio plays four stations, synthesized live with the Web Audio API rather than streamed. Beethoven loops the opening four bars of the Piano Sonata No. 14 “Moonlight” (Op. 27 No. 2), first movement. Mozart plays the opening of Eine kleine Nachtmusik (K. 525) and the first two bars of the Piano Sonata No. 16 in C (K. 545). Both pieces are public domain. Jazz improvises a vibraphone line over a ii–V–I–VI in C with walking bass, ride cymbal and rootless piano voicings; Blues improvises a guitar line over a 12-bar shuffle in A with boogie bass and a backbeat. The jazz and blues solos are random every time, so no two plays are the same.

The playable piano runs in your browser with the Web Audio API: two octaves from C4 to B5, and the Für Elise button plays the opening melody (public domain).