Music for Yoga – Why and How to Choose It

Nowadays you can find all kinds of music styles on youtube - including plenty of relaxation, meditation and yoga music. There are even yoga classes with live DJs adjusting their set to the yoga flow in real time. But how to choose the best yoga music for your home practice?

The melodies in our surroundings can have a big impact on us: they improve our mood, they can give us, or they can just help us relax and unwind. Especially in today’s fast-paced world, it’s important to regularly stop and relax. Calm, pleasant music can help us with that, be it while reading a book on the couch or during our yoga practice. 

Research has shown that listening to relaxaing music before falling asleep improves the quality of our sleep. This is because slow and soothing music reduces our level of restlessness. Yoga has a similar effect on our body and soul. So what could be better than combining yoga with calm music, to even increase their beneficial effects on us?

Yoga & Music – a Perfect Team

Sometimes it feels good to do yoga in silence in the morning when we can only hear our own breath. However, it is also worth experiencing the kind of harmony that the rhythms of yoga and music can create. Unfortunately the best yoga studios in Budapest are currently closed, so we need to find our own favorite melodies for our home practice. 

But to what kind of music exactly should we practice yoga? Well, just as the number of instructors and teaching styles, the options are plentiful.  Some prefer to practice to mantras on loop, some like to listen to relaxing and very calm music during class. You could even compile a playlist with your favorite songs – there are no rules. The best yoga music means something different to everyone.

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How Do We Choose the Right Music for Yoga?

Here are some things to keep in mind when choosing music for your yoga practice.

Dynamics

Especially for the warm up, choose very slow and soft melodies. For the next part of the lesson, we can already choose slightly more enegetic music that will last throughout the practice. But remember that yoga is mostly a very calm practice, which should still reflect in the music. Towards the end and especially during meditation you should choose very slow and relaxed music, to allow you to completely sink into the practice. 

Avoid music with lyrics in a language you understand

Listening to lyrics can distract us from our practice, so it is best to choose instrumental pieces.

Find the right volume

The music should support your practice, not overshadow it. So choose a volume not too loud. According to Bhakti Styler, an American yoga DJ and an instructor choosing the right music is the most important thing to enhance the practice, as well as setting the right volume and pace. The former should never suppress the instructor’s voice or distract the practitioners.

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Make different playlists

To keep the practice from getting boring, it’s a good idea to put together multiple playlists.Here you can find quite a few yoga playlists you can listen to on Spotify. Or just search for yoga music on Youtube and nothing stands between you and your calming yoga practice. 

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barbara