The idea of practising seems more suited to a ‘traditional’ musician like a guitarist or pianist than a DJ but there’s no real reason why a DJ shouldn’t practice their skills. Whilst current DJ technology now takes care of many of the elements of beat matching and so on, there’s still lots of things that a DJ could practice to improve.
Recording your own DJ sets and then listening back to them may sound a little self-obsessed, but is a great way to improve on your technique. If you listen to your own mixes in the same places / at the same time as you usually listen to tunes – say when driving etc. – it really helps you to hear your mixes as someone else might and spot areas that you can make better.
It is always worth practising the art of the blend: using EQ, filters and the volume controls to smoothly transition between tunes. Of course, there will always be times when you just need to slam the crossfader across, but carrying out a super smooth blend can create magic moments on a dance floor: working two tunes together, slowly dropping out elements of one and bringing in elements of the other, it’s a craft like any other, that benefits from practice and review.
Key matching. Pitch controls on DJ software and to lesser extend on CDJs allow you to play with the relative pitches of your music, which sometimes produces a pleasing harmonic match between two tunes. It can take time to train your ears to hear this and is a skill that is definitely worth practising.
Programming. This is a bit more tricky to practice at home, as generally the flow of the night is at least partly dictated by your audience. But it is still worth investing time mixing your tunes together at home, learning them inside out, so that you know which ones are slow burners, which are just DJ tools, and which are face melters. Put in the time and soon you’ll know them so well that you can then make informed programming decisions to take the night exactly where you want to.
Syncing your glitter cannons and pyrotechnics with your tunes. Again, this is a little difficult to practice in most bedroom studios due to the health and safety issues around setting off fireworks inside the house, but again, it’s always worth a quick practice, just to ensure everything is working fine.
You can be sure that if you don’t practice your skills and get your DJing game as good as it can be, then they’ll be a hungry DJ young gun just waiting to take your place. Practice makes perfect!
