digitalwiz
Played @ a sweet 16 birthday party on Saturday night ... a favour for one of my computer students.
This party was held at their summer house.....Family is loaded... vehicle collection.. boat collections,
Turned out that there were more old folks there than was young..... rich upper class.... every other male seem to have a licensed fire-arm
Decided that i would go old school, please the older crowd first.. which seemed to be what the birthday girl would have wanted.. turned out i hit the nail on the head. (of course having a projector and playing vids generated quite a buzz)
Problem is the type of music the younger crowd wanted was not necessarily appropriate for the setting... and of course they were in the minority. so i decided to blend.. both..... finding new tunes.. that complimented the old ones both in sound.. even if the genre was different. for example... soca.. combined with a new type of phenomena called (daggering).....which is not necessarily something the older heads approve of at all... funny how i had both groups dancing together on the floor... kept switching from old to new consistently... of course... keys in vdj..did help me a lot... so i found songs that i could combine flawlessly coupled with the fact that the younger folks... may be use to this music being played.. based upon influence by parents, and what they specialized in.
Saw a doctor I knew.. so i asked how many doctors were in the house... nearly half the patrons hands went up. I kept the music high tempo high.. energetic... so most of the songs i played were between 106bpm - 140 bpm figuring that i would tire out the old folks let them take a rest thereby making way for the young'ns... they never left the dancefloor.. no matter what I threw at them.
At one point I was totally playing new school and it seemed that the older folks never really picked up on it. One of the problems though was that quite a few of the teenagers had migrated to upstairs.. away from the eyes of their folks.. and were having the time of their life... of course i had no idea.. so figuring that the older music had more persons dancing... i went old school again...
At the end I felt that although the majority enjoyed the party.. the birthday girl and her crew suffered somewhat. Despite what I thought, she was ecstatic... said her father was so impressed by the music.. and so many persons had asked about the DJ...and loved how i was able to mix it up.
Had so many persons coming over commenting on the music... the father must have come up to me 7 times...commenting on the music.. (SEEMED that I may have landed a few more gig prospects).. even while packing up in the morning... i kept hearing... the music was the best they had seen in a while....(smile guess I have improved).
how do you deal with the generation difference and the music?
This party was held at their summer house.....Family is loaded... vehicle collection.. boat collections,
Turned out that there were more old folks there than was young..... rich upper class.... every other male seem to have a licensed fire-arm
Decided that i would go old school, please the older crowd first.. which seemed to be what the birthday girl would have wanted.. turned out i hit the nail on the head. (of course having a projector and playing vids generated quite a buzz)
Problem is the type of music the younger crowd wanted was not necessarily appropriate for the setting... and of course they were in the minority. so i decided to blend.. both..... finding new tunes.. that complimented the old ones both in sound.. even if the genre was different. for example... soca.. combined with a new type of phenomena called (daggering).....which is not necessarily something the older heads approve of at all... funny how i had both groups dancing together on the floor... kept switching from old to new consistently... of course... keys in vdj..did help me a lot... so i found songs that i could combine flawlessly coupled with the fact that the younger folks... may be use to this music being played.. based upon influence by parents, and what they specialized in.
Saw a doctor I knew.. so i asked how many doctors were in the house... nearly half the patrons hands went up. I kept the music high tempo high.. energetic... so most of the songs i played were between 106bpm - 140 bpm figuring that i would tire out the old folks let them take a rest thereby making way for the young'ns... they never left the dancefloor.. no matter what I threw at them.
At one point I was totally playing new school and it seemed that the older folks never really picked up on it. One of the problems though was that quite a few of the teenagers had migrated to upstairs.. away from the eyes of their folks.. and were having the time of their life... of course i had no idea.. so figuring that the older music had more persons dancing... i went old school again...
At the end I felt that although the majority enjoyed the party.. the birthday girl and her crew suffered somewhat. Despite what I thought, she was ecstatic... said her father was so impressed by the music.. and so many persons had asked about the DJ...and loved how i was able to mix it up.
Had so many persons coming over commenting on the music... the father must have come up to me 7 times...commenting on the music.. (SEEMED that I may have landed a few more gig prospects).. even while packing up in the morning... i kept hearing... the music was the best they had seen in a while....(smile guess I have improved).
how do you deal with the generation difference and the music?
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 8:22 am
DJBIGMARK
I have the same issue many times. You just have to feel the crowd out at first by playing different tunes and then settle in. When you have a wide range of ages you cant stay on one thing too long its best to mix it up. I usually jump from old to new in situations you described. JUST PLAY THE HITS..everything will be ok.
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 9:05 am
bogart
Had something similar this past Sat. 50th anniversary party.
Most people were in their early to mid 60's. Only 2 young girls
about 16 years old were in attendance.
Unfortunately these people were not dancers, so it was difficult to
get a feel. Not even a little toe tapping. I had one guy ask for Gene Autry
and Roy Rogers.
Finally the couple who's anniversay it was asked for some line
dances. That's the only thing they danced to for the rest of the evening.
And like you, many people came up and thanked me and said the
music was wonderful and they really enjoyed the evening.
Sometimes it's hard to figure.
Most people were in their early to mid 60's. Only 2 young girls
about 16 years old were in attendance.
Unfortunately these people were not dancers, so it was difficult to
get a feel. Not even a little toe tapping. I had one guy ask for Gene Autry
and Roy Rogers.
Finally the couple who's anniversay it was asked for some line
dances. That's the only thing they danced to for the rest of the evening.
And like you, many people came up and thanked me and said the
music was wonderful and they really enjoyed the evening.
Sometimes it's hard to figure.
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 10:26 am
DJmga
I did an engagement party/family get-together party a few months back, where the newly engaged couple had just returned from Australia. A mixed crowd with parents, aunts, uncles, cousins & friends. Mixed the music up alot to suit all ages. While I had some people dancing most of the night, it wasn't until the last hour or so that everyone was out. Didn't feel it was the best night I had, but like others here, had great compliments after the gig.
What I didn't realise until afterwards, was that most of the people at the party hadn't seen each other in years, so were more interested in chatting and catching-up on lost time than music or dancing! I was beginning to thing I was doing something wrong!!
To contrast with that party, I did a 90th birthday party a few weeks back. Yep, 90th !! I wasn't sure what to play for a 90-year old. Anyways, again a very mixed age group across 3 generations. The birthday girl didn't need to do any chatting or catching-up - she was on the dance floor all night and still there at 3am (yes, dancing!).
So just goes to show that you never know what to expect, and even when you've got certain expectation, your expectations can be turned on their heads so quickly ;-)
What I didn't realise until afterwards, was that most of the people at the party hadn't seen each other in years, so were more interested in chatting and catching-up on lost time than music or dancing! I was beginning to thing I was doing something wrong!!
To contrast with that party, I did a 90th birthday party a few weeks back. Yep, 90th !! I wasn't sure what to play for a 90-year old. Anyways, again a very mixed age group across 3 generations. The birthday girl didn't need to do any chatting or catching-up - she was on the dance floor all night and still there at 3am (yes, dancing!).
So just goes to show that you never know what to expect, and even when you've got certain expectation, your expectations can be turned on their heads so quickly ;-)
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 1:46 pm
Charlie Wilson
I get on the mic and start by saying: We have a mixed bag tonight ladies and gentelmen, I want everyone to be respectful to each others prefrence! I'll mix it up for as best as I can, now let's get pissed!
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 3:36 pm
Caliente123
I would never say something like that on a mic. Ill just mix it and try to keep as much people dancing all night. In every party, you will always have someone telling you what they only want to hear. The reality is...if everyone likes it, just keep doing your thing. From each gig i dj, i get many compliments and they request for my card.
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 5:35 pm
bryantpb
Charlie Wilson wrote :
I get on the mic and start by saying: We have a mixed bag tonight ladies and gentelmen, I want everyone to be respectful to each others prefrence! I'll mix it up for as best as I can, now let's get pissed!
Do you REALLY think ppl that are their to drink and dance is also there to listen to a DJ rant on the mic about apologizing if something goes wrong with the music because of who's there.
they prolly never even heard you, or said "what's HE talking about".
发表时间 Mon 22 Jun 09 @ 11:09 pm
dj-e-lectric
Most mobile parties are that way unless you are doing a very specific narrow aged audience. My main rule is keep the check signer the happiest so if it is the brides mom you do what she wants which sometimes means figuring out if she want to have a good time or if she wants her daughter to have a good time......bottom line though is money talks, especially if it can get you other gigs from "loaded" doctors!
Yeah, I'm a Dj hor, but I have bills, property investments and mortages to pay (which is tough in this sconomy believe me) and left the playing for free for my passion long behind me.
Yeah, I'm a Dj hor, but I have bills, property investments and mortages to pay (which is tough in this sconomy believe me) and left the playing for free for my passion long behind me.
发表时间 Tue 23 Jun 09 @ 12:37 am
mobiledjsteve
Where I work everyone has differentt tastes of music from Hip Hop to Country. I usually migrate all the diferent styles into 3-4 song sets and everyone is fine with it. There is also a lot of music that the young and older guests enjoy together. For weddings the Mobile Beat top 200 is a great resource.
发表时间 Tue 23 Jun 09 @ 12:32 pm
digitalwiz
Caliente123 wrote :
IIn every party, you will always have someone telling you what they only want to hear. The reality is...if everyone likes it, just keep doing your thing. From each gig i dj, i get many compliments and they request for my card.
So true.... In the middle of my gig Saturday nite... playing soca... had collie buddz - mamacita.... and played a remix to it beyonce - single ladies...in the middle of the crowd going frenzy... one person asked me to go to the original single ladies.. - I nodded that i would.. but never changed..... in fact she did make a couple more request throughout the night.. but none could have been played at that time... Eventually down the line played a couple...of her requests at the appropriate time
发表时间 Tue 23 Jun 09 @ 12:41 pm
DJ Andrey Seagull
digitalwiz,
can you post your history playlist from that gig so we can see what you played? It would be cool.
can you post your history playlist from that gig so we can see what you played? It would be cool.
发表时间 Tue 23 Jun 09 @ 11:47 pm
bryantpb
djfilosoff wrote :
digitalwiz,
can you post your history playlist from that gig so we can see what you played? It would be cool.
can you post your history playlist from that gig so we can see what you played? It would be cool.
Yes, please do?
发表时间 Wed 24 Jun 09 @ 12:47 am