Can you please every one.

Tips and techniques of the trade

Moderators: Mr Awesomer, JesseMiner, CafeSavoy

Message
Author
User avatar
Bob the Builder
Posts: 525
Joined: Wed Jun 04, 2003 6:53 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Contact:

Can you please every one.

#1 Post by Bob the Builder » Sun Jul 09, 2006 12:59 am

Ok so the below subject is something that every entertainer is going have to confront.

A - Do you try to entertain 100% of your audience

Or

B - Do you focus in and entertain 80% of your audience.


Some background
A typical audience is really a mixed bunch of people with some very different likes and dislikes across the spectrum. What one person my like another person my hate.
I is how ever very likely that these likes and dislikes are not split 50 / 50.
I fact there may be up to 4 or 5 groups with in the audience that have a particular preference, and this preference may even change during the event.

Now lets look and question A & B.

A - Do you try to entertain 100% of your audience

We have established that your audience is very mixed. In order to please them all your entertainment needs to be very mixed.
The draw back being if your entertainment is so mixed it lacks direction and every one may have an OK night but not a great night.

B - Do you focus in and entertain 80% of your audience.

If we take a different approach and say “I am aiming to entertain 80% of my audience” you have the opportunity of that 80% of patrons having a great night.
The obvious draw back here is that 20% are not going to enjoy the event.


So with the above in mine, Do you have a philosophy in applying the above to your DJing?

Brian
Image

Toon Town Dave
Posts: 661
Joined: Wed Nov 20, 2002 2:52 pm
Location: Saskatoon, Canada

#2 Post by Toon Town Dave » Sun Jul 09, 2006 1:03 pm

Here, we have lots of overlap with other dance styles, Lindy Hoppers and WCS dancers generally get along plus lots of folks do ballroom as well. Our scene has some pretty diverse musical tastes, from vintage to groove to jump blues to pop music to latin for the ballroom dancers.

The two things I recognize are that it is imposible to please everyone all of the time and people generally resist change.

My mantra is please most dancers most of the time.

I think I achieve this by managing expectations. To achieve it, I generally try and stick close to a core of music that has swing characteristics. That certainly includes lots of classic swing but also goes into rhythm and blues, some jump blues, even the occasional latin jazz number that fits the flow. There may only be one or two latin as a token recognition of the ballroom dancers but the night is mostly swinging stuff with varying tempos. The big thing I go for is consistency so folks can have some idea what to expect from one night to the next and decide if they prefer to go to the swing dance or the ballroom dance that night.

Without a core theme and consistentcy, it becomes difficult to please anyone. One of our local DJs started playing a lot of ballroom music at our local swing night years ago ... it didn't really get any more ballroom dancers out but it annoyed a lot of swing dancers.

User avatar
Cyrano de Maniac
Posts: 97
Joined: Tue Mar 21, 2006 2:11 pm
Location: South Saint Paul, Minnesota
Contact:

#3 Post by Cyrano de Maniac » Sun Jul 09, 2006 4:55 pm

At least I don't face a mixed swing/non-swing crowd, as our dances are specifically targeted at swing.

Anyway, I find the most important part for me is to be true to what I believe is good danceable music. I've found that when I worry about what particular sets of dancers or other DJs will think, that my sets aren't as good in general. Not that I ignore anyone on the dance floor, just that I first stay true to myself.

If one wants to try to please 90+% of the dancers, of various skill levels and interests, you need to throw most everyone a bone. Realizing that most people are going to sit out a song or two after dancing three in a row, I think the practical implication is to not play long stretches of any one style/tempo. I deliberately avoid back-to-back songs in the same genre, even prefering at least two other styles between such repetitions. So though I might like big band the most, I won't put Basie and Ellington back-to-back, nor Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman. Similarly, I try not to put two female vocalists next to eachother, nor a long stretch of instrumental-only or vocal tracks.

I also tend to do tempo waves that last 5-8 songs, so that nobody sits out for too long (though there'll always be complaints). Finally, I'll stretch myself a little and find a few songs in genres I don't care for (e.g. rockabilly), but which I can at least stomach, and get them in a few places throughout the night.

I suppose this could open me to charges of being somewhat random, but at least its a carefully managed randomness. So far this approach has yielded a positive response, with only a few naysayers here and there (and mostly about tempo -- I admit to liking it a bit slower than other local DJs).

Oh, I also look at the dynamics of the crowd. In my particular case, we usually have the "civilians" with us early in the night, primarily doing East Coast, and the "lifers" stay until the bitter end and mostly interested in Lindy. As such, I tend to frontload the night with uptempo music, and reduce the overall level of the tempo waves as the night goes on.

If someone comes to me and asks for a latin number, a waltz, a polka, or whatnot, I can honestly tell them I don't have anything of that nature in my collection. Which avoids the unpleasantness of telling them "This is a swing event, leave me alone". Some metal on the other hand... :twisted:

Brent

User avatar
Bob the Builder
Posts: 525
Joined: Wed Jun 04, 2003 6:53 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Contact:

#4 Post by Bob the Builder » Tue Jul 11, 2006 4:32 am

The diversity of music preferences in Melbourne.

In Melbourne within the swing venues there is virtually no dances danced out side the Swing Dances Genre, and in reality this is limited to Lindy hop, Balboa, Collegiate Shag, Charleston and Blues dancing. However with in this the music taste of the patrons at a set event is very mixed. Classic Swing, Fast and Slow, Groove /Soul Jazz, Blues and all its variations, Hot 20’s Jazz, Neo-Swing, Rhythm and blues and even some non-swing music would all be appreciated by at least some of the patrons.
Within a set (90 minutes) this is a lot if you wanted to cover them all. With my DJing style I prefer to have transitions between genres, at least playing 2 songs of one Genre in a row before maybe moving on to the next, if I see fit.
Personally I don’t like trying to cram everything in. Maybe it’s the quality within genres rather than quantity of genres covered. So from this I know that I’m not pleasing everyone in that room. To me I’ve done my job if I’ve managed to please 80% of the patrons. So there are going to be people that don’t care for my DJing. But the great thing is that there are other local DJ’s what will spin within the genres I don’t play.
Image

User avatar
Cyrano de Maniac
Posts: 97
Joined: Tue Mar 21, 2006 2:11 pm
Location: South Saint Paul, Minnesota
Contact:

#5 Post by Cyrano de Maniac » Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:58 am

That makes a ton of sense.

I guess I'm "lucky" in that the sets I've typically dealt with have either been 3 to 3.5 hours, or 1 hour where I know pretty well what to expect from the other DJs, having danced to their stuff many times. For the long sets, I can work in most everything, to the point of worrying "OK, is five Louis Armstrong songs in a night too much, because I'm running out of everything else?" For the short sets I can choose what I like that fills in the gaps left by the other DJs.

Brent

P.S. By the way, the answer is "no". You can never get enough Satchmo. :lol:

User avatar
Bob the Builder
Posts: 525
Joined: Wed Jun 04, 2003 6:53 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Contact:

#6 Post by Bob the Builder » Sat Jul 15, 2006 5:46 pm

I’m interested in what some of you other experienced DJ’s think of this subject. I know some of you are lucky enough to play at specialized venues ie Groove or Classic swing, and thus it’s not as much a problem. But you don’t spin at those venues that whole time.

Do you accept you can’t please everyone, or do you just try to cover all the music tastes?
Image

User avatar
kitkat
Posts: 606
Joined: Tue May 27, 2003 10:34 am
Location: Minneapolis, MN

#7 Post by kitkat » Sat Jul 15, 2006 5:52 pm

I just accept that I can't please everyone. I'm an "80%er." Especially when I have a short set, I play the kind of music I figure people hire me knowing I play. Otherwise, fans will be disappointed, the uncaring will think I'm mediocre (which I usually am when I try to play outside what I know well), and people who love me will get a false impression of what I can do for them in the future. If the crowd doesn't at all match what the organizer and I anticipated, then I play "safe tunes" within that genre--things I think will convince haters in the crowd to like my music.

I've always thought of it as making a kid like brussel sprouts. If he/she gets to eat them prepared by a world-class chef, he/she might like them. This might especially be true if the chef knows something about what makes that kid like the flavors he/she does (in this case, that'd be comparable to "music theory," used in the expanded pop/rock sense, not the narrow classical sense).

I definitely stick to my "variously seasoned veggies" unless the organizer makes some requests, though, and even then, I'm not carrying much, so I ask for some help ("Do you have any CDs like that? I'm a little short on them!")

Surreal
Posts: 402
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 3:31 pm
Location: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

#8 Post by Surreal » Fri Aug 25, 2006 4:15 pm

I generally shoot for that 80%, under the assumption that if the majority is having a good time, that positive energy will rub off on the remaining 20%. I find the ones who are picky with the music are also the most willing to leave early, whereas the rest of them might not like the music but then use that as an excuse to socialize. In this case, I cater to the 20% moreso at the beginning of the night, since once they're in a good dancing mood they're less likely to mince about the music for the rest of the night. Then I switch back to my "normal" set.

User avatar
Lars
Posts: 69
Joined: Thu Dec 04, 2003 5:20 am
Location: Milwaukee
Contact:

#9 Post by Lars » Fri Aug 25, 2006 6:37 pm

My goal is to disappoint anyone who requests "Sex Bomb" by Tom Jones.
Image

User avatar
Lawrence
Posts: 1213
Joined: Mon Dec 09, 2002 2:08 pm
Location: Austin, Texas
Contact:

#10 Post by Lawrence » Sun Aug 27, 2006 10:24 am

No, especially if you have Reuben, Jesse, Rayned, Julius, Greg, Faulty and me in the same room.
Lawrence Page
Austin Lindy Hop
http://www.AustinLindy.com

User avatar
CafeSavoy
Posts: 1138
Joined: Mon Nov 18, 2002 6:25 pm
Location: Mobtown
Contact:

#11 Post by CafeSavoy » Sun Aug 27, 2006 12:33 pm

Lawrence wrote:No, especially if you have Reuben, Jesse, Rayned, Julius, Greg, Faulty and me in the same room.
i dunno. after all, i think we all like the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.

User avatar
Lawrence
Posts: 1213
Joined: Mon Dec 09, 2002 2:08 pm
Location: Austin, Texas
Contact:

#12 Post by Lawrence » Sun Aug 27, 2006 2:30 pm

CafeSavoy wrote:
Lawrence wrote:No, especially if you have Reuben, Jesse, Rayned, Julius, Greg, Faulty and me in the same room.
i dunno. after all, i think we all like the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
"Live In Swing City" (Yes) or "They Came to Swing" (No)?

If the former CD, then "Main Stem/Harlem Air Shaft" (Reuben/Faulty) or "C-Jam/Happy Go Lucky" (Greg/Lawrence) :P 8)

Also, I was just being grumpy earlier. Of course it's the DJ's job to find something to appeal to the majority of the crowd (even if its not your personally ideal night of music). However, it would take a homogenous crowd or a redundant, bland DJ set of "Lindy Top 40" songs to please everyone, which will thrill no one and never change things up. Similar to how I treat my woman: You gotta take the risk of offending them every once in a while if you're ever gonna thrill 'em.
Lawrence Page
Austin Lindy Hop
http://www.AustinLindy.com

User avatar
CafeSavoy
Posts: 1138
Joined: Mon Nov 18, 2002 6:25 pm
Location: Mobtown
Contact:

#13 Post by CafeSavoy » Mon Aug 28, 2006 9:22 am

Lawrence wrote:
CafeSavoy wrote:
Lawrence wrote:No, especially if you have Reuben, Jesse, Rayned, Julius, Greg, Faulty and me in the same room.
i dunno. after all, i think we all like the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
"Live In Swing City" (Yes) or "They Came to Swing" (No)?

If the former CD, then "Main Stem/Harlem Air Shaft" (Reuben/Faulty) or "C-Jam/Happy Go Lucky" (Greg/Lawrence) :P 8)

Also, I was just being grumpy earlier.
Haha. Just having fun with you.

Roy
Posts: 410
Joined: Mon Mar 31, 2003 1:23 pm
Location: San Francisco
Contact:

#14 Post by Roy » Mon Aug 28, 2006 9:42 am

Lawrence wrote:
CafeSavoy wrote:
Lawrence wrote:No, especially if you have Reuben, Jesse, Rayned, Julius, Greg, Faulty and me in the same room.
i dunno. after all, i think we all like the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
"Live In Swing City" (Yes) or "They Came to Swing" (No)?

If the former CD, then "Main Stem/Harlem Air Shaft" (Reuben/Faulty) or "C-Jam/Happy Go Lucky" (Greg/Lawrence) :P 8)
Don't forget Black and Tan Fantasy for Faulty.

User avatar
Mr Awesomer
Posts: 1089
Joined: Mon Nov 18, 2002 10:21 pm
Location: Altadena, CA
Contact:

#15 Post by Mr Awesomer » Mon Aug 28, 2006 10:55 am

Funny... I like that entire album.
Reuben Brown
Southern California

Locked