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Keys to a good transition

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  • January 31, 2012 at 10:10 am #1002779
    Julian Gutierrez
    Participant

    I guess it depends on what sort of transitions you’re trying to make. Who are the DJs that inspire you? What sort of transitions, or mixes, do they perform?

    I’m new on this forum, but I can see that most of the DJs here will blend one song into another using beat matching and phrase matching when they mix. That is, they are literally mixing two (or sometimes more) records together, with both songs playing together over a period of time, rather than one simply fading out followed by the next one fading in.

    January 31, 2012 at 12:55 pm #13753
    mr_john
    Member

    Whether you’re fading, cutting, dropping, or whatever, phrasing is key. You can have a perfectly beatmatched transition in key and everything, but if it comes at the wrong time it sounds awful.

    So, in your first mix at the 3:00 mark when you drop the bass out and it’s just that little “danana___ danana” keep counting the beat. 1,2,3,4_ 2,2,3,4_ 3,2,3,4_ 4,2,3,4; 1,2,3,4 and so on. Easiest way to do it is to bring the next song in on the one: The 1st bar count 1.

    You’ll notice that changes in the song come on the 1.

    4, 8, 16, 32. Noticing a pattern there? Those are generally your “drop zones.” That is to say, 5, 9, 17, and 33 are. That’s the basic structure of the song. Dropping on 12 sounds odd. The song doesn’t flow correctly.

    Once you get the timing down, you can work on other things. But that’s the most important part.

    January 31, 2012 at 2:21 pm #13757
    eros
    Member

    I agree with what has been said so far.

    I think knowing your music really really well is vital. Most EDM music has a certain pattern (as mr_john pointed out) with a certain number of bars of intro before more elements get brought in etc. When you load a track into a deck, take time to look at the wave form, there you can actually see where these changes occur. If you count as suggested above then you will notice that indeed the 4, 8, 16, 32 rule holds true. The waveform changes will almost always correspond with a possible “drop zone”.

    Harmonic mixing also makes for a smoother transition. When two pieces of music are in the same or a complimentary key there is less likely to be a clash. Whilst harmonic mixing has its fans, it is not an absolute rule, it’s just another option to consider. I find it’s particularly useful if you’re doing mash ups or cutting in and out of tracks quickly. Now (excuse this shameless plug) but it helps to illustrate my point; if you listen to the second demo on my soundcloud (Trance Club Mid Set) I bring in the loop of the second track at just the 30sec mark. The entire set is harmonically mixed so if you listen to the transitions they should hopefully sound smooth, well at least from a key point of view !!

    Finally, I would highly recommend you listen to any of the “A State of Trance – Year Mixes”. There’s about 60 tracks on each CD, each goes for around 2 minutes before the next transition. It’s a great place to get ideas and hear a lot of different transitions.

    February 1, 2012 at 5:01 pm #13839
    Zigs Paredes
    Participant

    The tracks were awesome in the mix. I would love to see you redo this mix in the future when you have a higher skill set (which is given). Props to putting yourself out there to be critiqued, shows your serious about getting better! I agree that phrasing is important. Take the time to study pieces of house or dance music and see that it normally flows in 8/16/32 beat phrases.

    Another example of this phrasing (as a addendum to Mr_John’s example)
    In the last song of the mix, after the massive epic motherfucker buildup (I think that’s what it says), count out the kick hits out loud and notice that 32 counts (or 4 sets of 8 counts) in you get a double snare hit and then another 32 counts in you get “epic motherfucker” which goes into another 32 counts which is more obviously less heavy. These changes are where you would normally drop the next song in.

    February 1, 2012 at 8:25 pm #1002805
    DJspin
    Member

    Thanks guys, really appreciate it, this is helping me alot.

    February 2, 2012 at 8:13 pm #13968
    DJspin
    Member

    Posted a new Mix feedback?

    February 7, 2012 at 10:07 am #1002887
    mr_john
    Member

    he can be taught! haha Nice I like it. It flows, it’s smooth, good work!

    February 7, 2012 at 8:03 pm #14422
    DJspin
    Member

    Thanks man. Really appreciate someone who takes the time to listen to my stuff, do you have a soundcloud? Would love to hear your stuff If you have some.

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