New to Midi Consoles… What would you recommend for a newbie?

Hey DjMonster !

There is a big variety of Midi-controllers out there. Me myself, I have the DDJ WeGo (Pioneer), which I’m very satisfied with. It’s probably one of pioneer cheapest pieces but it’s definately not bad. Obviously with pioneer you can’t go wrong, Numark is good as well. I recommend not going for anything from Hercules that’s under $300. These are most likely small midi-controllers with a not so decent finishing on the casing, etc…. I don’t know the interface of Mixmeister Pro, but I think it’s best for you to do some try-outs with Virtual DJ and with Traktor and depend for yourself which software you like the most. Virtual DJ is more likely used with a pioneer and Traktor with Numark (both can be mixed though).

The key part is that you start off with learning how to beatmatch though. This is the basic of DJ’ing! Never touch your sync button and don’t use it to mix either. When you can beatmatch properly, try beatmatching by the sound of the music itself and don’t look at your software anymore. When you can beatmatch on your own controller and you can do it just by listening, then you can probably DJ on almost every midi-controller and even on CDJ’s after a while.

I have my DDJ WeGo which I use at home to try out stuff and mixes, but when I play at a party it’s always on CDJ’s, which is an easy transfer for me just because I can beatmatch without the sync-button

Hope this helped you !

Hi, Monster. Are you planning on a setup that will allow you to do small karaoke sets with just your controller too?

In that case the Denon MC6000mk2 might be what you are looking for. It has two seperate mic channels with individual EQ, volume control and even a reverb. It also is a full stand-alone mixer with matrix inputs, allowing up to a lot of seperate external pieces of equipment to be hooked up (not sure what Karaoke gear you are using so can’t comment on that, but will if you let me know) and easily switch between the things hooked up to a channel.

On top of that it is a very full-featured controller and totally indestructable. It’s also very pro and you having your own company, I think your customers expect you to show up with something slightly better than starter gear like the DDJ-SB (the WeGo is definitely at the lower end of the spectrum), the Numark Mixtrack Pro (2 or 3), the Denon MC2000 and the Reloop BeatMix (2 or 4). It’s also decidedly cheaper than, say, the Pioneer DDJ-SX2 and it has some features for playing video (might come in handy with the karoake?) and in general is the mobile DJs workhorse frankly. Although I currently own and use a DDJ-SX, getting another MC6000mk2 (had the mk1 for over two years) is VERY high on my priority list.

Another piece of software that is great value for money, supports the MC6000 and video is Mixvibes Cross. There is a free version that you can download to play with that doesn’t support a controller, there is a trial version that is (almost) full-featured for 14 days and the full version is only 49 USD with a 29 USD upgrade for the video features.
It’s what I use for my (paid) gigs as a mobile DJ and it more than fits my needs. I’d put it closest to Serato in the way it works.

Since you do karaoke also, I would recommended to check out the software, Virtual DJ, it supported for mp3+g format for a karaoke, and check out what controller that do support Virtual DJ (there is plenty out there)

And all you gotta do is to run cable from your laptop to your visual screen, I used to run hdmi from my laptop to a big screen TV