Newbie Beatmix Technique

Well … why would they ever want to move for vinyl (or CDJs for that matter) would be my first question 🙂

Nudging vinyl is unlike anything imho and even with vinyl there are various ways of nudging. From label to outer edge to even platter. You could actually do it this way on a TT, but it would be more time-consuming than it is now.
So personally I would worry about how to beatmix vinyl when they actually cross that bridge and expect to have a new learning curve anyway.

Now nudging CDJs is another story, but then again, there really is no difference with controller jogs … so CDJs will work just as well with this pitch fader/start-stop way of working.

So far no real thoughts. But hold your horses, here they come.

Bar having absolute hearing which, for the purpose of my thoughts, I will consider not to be the case here, there are some drawbacks to this system of beatmatching in it’s own right (so regardless of if you are prepping for vinyl or not). I am also assuming you are not using visual (i.e. laptop screen) aid, like beatgrid/parallel waveforms/BPM and such. If you are using those, then my thoughts hold even more true.
1) It’s a time consuming method. You need to stop-restart many times.
2) It’s a method that gives you little or no relevant feedback about whether you need to go faster/slower and by much or little this way.
3) You will not develop the skill to adjust (nudge) once you commence the actual transition. It is always possible (and even happens a lot) that you miss your cue and need to nudge forward or backward a tad to hit the match again. This skill come natural to those who use jogwheel nudging (or even nudge buttons) to get to where they want to go. Clearly you can’t just stop and restart the track if you started the transition already. If you are used to working the jogwheel (and have heard the effect of using it in your headphones many many many times) you become more relaxed using it while a track is already playing (a totally essential skill with vinyl to btw).

So, my advice would be to encourage them to use the jogwheel in a blind (i.e. no visual feedback) situation.

Personally I believe strongly in the outer ring “better/not better” method. Because it will give you information about the direction to change pitch (faster/slower), the amount of change yet to go (much/little) and if you started the wrong way (for example faster) it’s very simple to go back to where you started (pull back quarter turn then another quarter turn in the other direction. Make your nudges snappy, not slow for best results.

I don’t worry about starting with a matching (down)beat during the process. If I get too far off I just nudge (after the first time I know what direction) to somewhere near matching and then do my next nudge/pitch adjust. Once I feel I’ve got ir right, I might cue/play it once more on the downbeat to check and do final mini-adjustments.

Hope that helps some.

I don’t see anything wrong with that, you just need to continue with your lessons and get to the next step, which is getting the beats back in time without relying on re-cueing. This can be done either by a nudge, or by riding the pitchfader past where it should be to “catch up” with the beat and then bringing it back down, but not as far as it was originally. The whole process is often repeated with a few re-cues along the way too – even on vinyl bringing the needle back to the beginning a few times is rather common, so its not as if she’s learnt anything wrong, just that you need to keep expanding her toolkit. In fact as its more subtle, re-aligning the beats using pitchfaders often sounds a lot better than nudges anyway, so I wouldn’t discourage the use of it in any way – mastering the technique is harder though.

The pitchfader and cue technique is great for getting a basic tempo match anyway (and as I say is hardly unusual), but as you guess closer, you need longer periods to test its accuracy making it a bit impractical. The simplest way to get her to see the value of riding pitch or nudges if you can’t otherwise, is to try and get her to do longer mixes where adjustments will be required. Once she’s learned them, they’ll be transferable to vinyl anyway (with a bit of practice) so no need to stress it at this stage.

@bashtid: fader-riding is technically EXACTLY the same thing as nudging. In both cases you temporarily speed up or slow down to return to your old speed. Only difference being that with nudging you go back to the exact same speed as before. With fader-riding (especially if you want to adjust the pitch in the same movement) getting that done is, as you correctly stated, very hard to get right every time.

I have taught quite a few people as well as visited various DJ schools. I can safely say that the nudge method is the most widely used version (at least here in Holland). People riding pitch faders are typically the older generation that grew up with vinyl. Most if not all of the CDJ and controller DJs I know personally use nudging rather than pitch fader riding.

The nudge method is easier to teach imho, easier to learn and easier to execute.

Personally I don’t agree with your statement that riding the fader is more subtle and often sounds a lot (a lot even) better than nudging. I dare say you have never heard a pro DJ use nudging if you believe that to be true.

Just my usual 3 cents.

ok, try again…

I dare say you have never heard a pro DJ use nudging if you believe that to be true.

lol. I didn’t come here to name drop, but if you want to play those kind of games, never mind hearing, the guys I play with regularly, headline Berghain and such. Its actually from them that I’ve picked up the value of more subtle techniques, in addition to nudging. (see the part about “expanding the toolbox” rather than reducing it all to a single monkey wrench) Nothing against nudging here – it wouldn’t have been mentioned first in my post otherwise, as well as pointing out a more advanced technique, especially in a situation where the learner is showing an affinity for using the pitch fader, thought they might get a headstart on mastering it.

Personally I don’t agree with your statement that riding the fader is more subtle and often sounds a lot (a lot even) better than nudging.

I’m obviously just some guy making up stories on the internet, don’t take my word for it, here’s a someone from Holland even whose 3cents the OP might value (relevant bit is at around 8min mark, but watching from just before 4min mark will give you some context)

(and no, I’m not a fan – just remembered it was there and wasn’t going to go searching for random examples when there was one from a “pro” with explanation just waiting)