Social Workout

Your Playlists

Non-Tired Yoga Music

Music can make or break a workout. Spin teachers are usually hip to this. But yoga teachers aren't always quite as fresh... Over at Well + Good NYC, our friends got stuck listening to the "Hallelujah" by Jeff Buckley in, count them, three different yoga classes this week. In cased you've missed it, we have a treasure trove fabulous playlists for yoga and every other conceivable workout (Music for strip-spin? Check. For extended plank sessions? Check.) But your yoga teacher might not know about this fab resource. In their rage against Jeff Buckley, Well + Good listed off a slew of other songs that need a yoga break ("Just Breathe," "The Blower's Daughter," etc.) Now that the yoga teachers of the world know what not to play, how about suggestions for what they should play. What's the best song you've heard in yoga lately? Or how about potentially awesome songs no yoga teacher has yet braved?

Your Playlists

Ruth Zukerman's Keep-It-New Spin Playlist

Ruth Zukerman, co-founder of Flywheel Sports (the other co-founder is Tiki Barber), says, "I can't emphasize how important the music is...Music is what keeps it new every time I get up there." So we asked her for a playlist. Here's the music that's keeping her going right now.*

Your Playlists

Jessica Bellofatto's Favorite Yoga Music

Collectively, we like yoga music, so long as it's the right kind of yoga music. Consensus is chill is best. Urbansherpa shared her chill and fabulous yoga playlist back in '09, but if you're looking to refresh your rotation or gather some ammo to nudge the teacher who has the Hare Krishna chanting on eternal repeat toward a brighter future, we've got ideas. After Jessica Bellofatto of KamaDeva Yoga finished telling us about life as a yoga-triathlete, we asked her about her favorite yoga music. Her top picks: 

1. Anything Neil Young
2. Stairway to Heaven
3. Tracy Chapman — always amazing
4. Eva Cassidy
5. The Dead Man Walking soundtrack 
6. The very beautiful Into the Wild soundtrack 

Curious souls can listen to the Into the Wild soundtrack after the jump. 

Your Playlists

Cooler Yoga Music: "The Yoga Sessions"

What makes good yoga music? Sitar? Chanting? The kirtan crowd leans that way, and they seem to be having a marvelous time. But Yoga Organix begs to differ. Yoga instructor Derek Beres has a following at Equinox, but he also has a following as DJ and music journalist, and now YogaOrganix is putting out his first yoga music album. Together he and David "Duke Mushroom" Schommer are EarthRise Sound System, and they describe their new album, "The Yoga Sessions," as "percussively rich" and "dubby." Set for a 1/1/2010 release, the tracks are apparently intended to be as good in a club as they are in a yoga class. So if you could use a little break from Bhagavan Das (not that you don't love him!) consider slipping "The Yoga Sessions" to your yoga teacher as a little New Year's present. 

Your Playlists

Anitak's Treadmill Playlist

A couple of weeks ago, Anitak forgot her headphones. "I felt so deflated that I almost went straight home! Treadmill + no music = ultimate boredom." It was particularly painful because she'd just put together a new high-energy playlist. She made it through, but here's the playlist — download it, and you'll see that it would indeed be rough to be cut off from these tunes. Anitak's full liner notes after the jump.

Your Playlists

Oiwuc's Whitney Houston Playlist

Oiwuc has rediscovered running, and Whitney Houston gets some of the credit. Whitney wakes her up, and pumps her up, and, in return, she receives Oiwuc's official "looooooove!" rating. We asked Oiwuc for the tracks that rekindled her running crush, and here they are....

Your Playlists

k.ben's Mellow Run Mix

When she lived in Brooklyn, k.ben says, this was her running playlist.

It got me from my apartment to Prospect Park, around the 3 mile loop, and back. It is evidence of the fact that I run a pretty mellow pace (between a 10 and an 11-minute mile); and it is evidence most of all of the fact that I have no idea what the kids are listening to. (Does anyone even know who Bill Withers is anymore?) But it's very listenable, in sort of an easy listening way, I admit. The last few songs, from Bill Withers on, were nice when I'd not want to run home and I'd just walk, or when i'd have time for a little stretching and yoga after. Sun salutations to Lovely Day are AWESOME.

Her full liner notes, and two extra tracks (too cool for playlist.com) after the jump. 

Your Playlists

Twinklefee's Finish-Strong Cardio Mix

Twinklefee is a devotee of the Union Square Crunch. She spends impressive amounts of time there. It's where she trains with Jeff, and fell madly in love with anti-gravity yoga. Of this playlist, she says, "I rely on these songs when I need that extra boost to get me through a cardio session (let's be honest, that's all the time!) and I've organized them into four sections - the warm up, getting going, finishing strong, and cool down.  If I can keep up with the beats for the full 57.6 minutes, I know I've done a body good." 

Your Playlists

Running Manhattan with @HereNow

The artist formerly known as sneathd, now @HereNow, is a man of active mind and body, a connoisseur of the urban workout. Today he shares the tunes that inspire his various runs around Manhattan: "Maybe a lunchtime run over to the East River Park with some speed intervals on the running track.  Maybe around Central Park. Perhaps over to Riverside Park, and a run up the Hudson River. Did you know that the Hudson River is a fjord?" I didn't, in fact. I also didn't know how fresh Ganesh was (See track 9).  @HereNow's full text liner notes after the jump, but we've inlcuded his graphical liner notes in the image above, and as an Adobe PDF right here, suitable for framing....

[Ed note: iTunes, very uncooly, doesn't offer "Country at War" and "Black Funk Rex," but track them down and add them. You'll be glad you did].

Your Playlists

CJ's Food Coma Recovery Mix

CJ knows how to stay motivated. She took home the April Challenge's "General Heroism" prize. She spins, she runs, she pole dances, like all three, every day. Okay, that's an exaggeration, but she's dedicated. And these are the songs she listens to on endless repeat. They're good for the gym, but she says they're also what you gets her through post-lunch food comas and keeps her awake and alive enough to work out in the first place. So put these songs on your iPod, and let CJ take your hand and gently lead you to the gym.