It’s a familiar scene—a poker player, maybe wearing a hoodie or some other poker website branded-garb, with sunglasses on, and a headphone stuck in their ear at the felt table. While the amount of players listening to music tends to be split during televised poker events like the WSOP, many players opt for some sort of sound during play.
Even if you’re not a poker pro, chances are (especially with mobile poker taking off in a big way) you listen to some sort of music or entertainment while playing.
But what are pros listening to while they play poker? We take a look—not at lists that countdown gambling-themed songs, but what poker players actually listen to while they play.
Let’s take a look at what poker players listen to while they play.
Daniel Negreanu’s Nature Sounds
Daniel Negreanu’s choice of song isn’t a song, per se—the Canadian player loves to listen to ambient sounds. Like the type of music, you might hear when you get a massage or use to fall asleep at night. You’ll find neutral and natural sounds like water running, whale noises, a summer forest (yes, you might be surprised to learn an entire forest does have a sound), or sounds from a mountain region, to name a few.
Negreanu at the World Series of Poker main event in Las Vegas, 2015.
This type of non-lyrical music could certainly help calm a player’s nerves while playing poker games, and help them to relax while drowning out outside noise—but be careful, don’t fall asleep.
This Music ‘Starts Phil Hellmuth Up’
Phil Hellmuth rocking headphones at the poker table in 2011.
Phil Hellmuth prefers to listen to rock songs from the 1970s, 80’s and ‘90’s — he likes to tap his foot to the beat while playing.
Some of the songs you can probably find on Hellmuth’s playlist include anything from Led Zeppelin, Livin’ on a Prayer, Don’t Stop Believin’, or Losing my Religion, to name a few hits from those decades.
Wonder if that foot-tapping is intimidating?
Mike Sexton
The poker world (and the world at large) lost a poker legend in 2020, but luckily, the famed poker player and commentator left us with a big legacy to remember him by.
We did promise that this list didn’t include poker-themed songs, but Mike Sexton preferred them. Sexton preferred music inspired by poker greats, or that related to the game. His favorite? Unsurprisingly, ‘The Gambler’ by Kenny Rogers is one of his favorites—however, the legend had a great time singing ‘Do you dare make a bet with Amarillo Slim?’ during Slim’s Super Bowl of Poker in the ’80s.
Maria Ho Prefers Pop Royalty Who Can Dance
Maria Ho at the felt, 2018.
Did you know Maria Ho was once on American Idol? In addition to being a savvy poker professional, Ho is a talented musician and skilled songstress. She made it to the ‘Hollywood Week’ round of auditioning on the popular reality show, and although she says she auditioned to support her sister, she comes from a musical family and enjoys singing.
While Maria Ho doesn’t necessarily listen to the King of Pop or Queen Bey at the poker table (maybe we just wanted to mention her Idol run, okay?) in an interview for PokerNews Ho said Michael Jackon and Beyone are the artists she’d most like to dance back-up for.
While the jury’s out on how helpful music is at the poker table — most studies suggest that music, especially with lyrics, tends to reduce focus and add distractions.
But there’s no doubt that outside chatter can ultimately be more distracting, we don’t see headphones or music disappearing from WSOP tables anytime soon. Headphones at the poker table are here to stay.
