Swing DJ Resources has been launched!

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Swing DJ Resources Launched

In August 2011, I started “DJ Chrisbe’s Swing DJ Resources Email List” to share my knowledge and my ideas about Swing DJ’ing. Although my goal was to send out one or two emails per month, it never went that far. I realized pretty soon – I asked each of my subscribers what they are interested in – that this is not the right medium to do it, there must be a hub instead. A hub where everyone can just take what he or she needs about Swing DJ’ing: Some need basics in DJ skills Some would love to know more about [...]

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Virtual DJ Chrisbe in Barcelona Spain

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Virtual DJ Chrisbe in Barcelona

This week, I spontaneously did something, I haven’t done before: I was a virtual DJ for a dance scene in a different city in a different country! A short email request Last Wednesday, I received a short email by Jordi from the Swing Maniacs in Barcelona, if I would like to be their DJ at their event “SM Classic Swing Jam!” in the evening of the same day. Yes, of course, that sounds like fun! Well, the point is, I was not in Barcelona, so how did I do it? Setting up the hardware To be a virtual DJ you need [...]

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How to Organize Music in iTunes. Part 3: Smart Playlists

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How to Organize Music in iTunes. Part 3: Smart Playlists | Shuffle Projects

I have the feeling that many iTunes users still don’t know how powerful Smart Playlists (for my German speaking readers: Intelligente Wiedergabelisten) are. When Apple introduced them many years ago, I was immediately hooked and it changed the way how I organize and sort music forever. To really benefit from the flexibility of Smart Playlists, you need a good system of pre-organizing your music with tags, BPM and ratings. If you missed these posts, please check out part 1: Tagging and part 2: BPM & Rating of the series “How to Organize Music in iTunes” before you read further. Now, [...]

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How to Organize Music in iTunes. Part 2: BPM & Rating

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How to Organize Music in iTunes. Part 2: BPM & Rating

Thank you so much for all the comments and emails you have sent me after publishing part 1: Tagging in iTunes. I’ll post some of the ideas I’ve got from my readers in a wrap-up post after this small series is finished. So, let’s start with part two. We need two more parameters to have an idea about the music in our library: the tempo of the song and a personal rating system. Detecting BPM (Beats Per Minute) As you know, the tempo is defined in BPM or beats per minute. Detecting BPM is manual work and it takes a [...]

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How to Organize Music in iTunes. Part 1: Tagging

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How To Organize Music in iTunes: Tagging | Shuffle Projects

Note: This is a post especially for the subscribers of my Swing DJ Resources Email List. Some of these posts won’t be public in future. So, if you would like to receive ALL the posts, then sign up now in the side bar on the right side or at the end of this post. Nowadays, tags are very common to organize or sort all kind of information. In marked contrast to many different software products, which allow us to set all kind of tags, iTunes still doesn’t provide a tagging system to organize music and media. This is part 1 [...]

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Staff DJ at Herräng Dance Camp 2011

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Herrang Dance Camp

I know, Herräng is over since weeks and this post is long overdue… eventually, here is the report about my week as staff DJ. Herräng Dance Camp (HDC) is a unique event, you know it or you have heard about it. There was a time, 10 years ago to be exactly, when I thought it’s too overcrowded and I decided not to attend it anymore, which I did for the following four years. Nowadays, everything is different to me. Yes, there are even more (much more) people. But I couldn’t imagine to let the summer pass without having been in [...]

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Launch Of DJ Chrisbe’s Swing DJ Resources Email List

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Swing DJ

Update 4 September 2012: Today, Shuffle Projects launched “Swing DJ Resources”. The website is the successor of this email list. Check out the website and subscribe there for free resources & updates! In 2006 I started swing DJ’ing and in the last years since then I’ve acquired a lot of know-how. As you might know, high quality swing music in classes and especially at swing events is a personal matter of me. How we dance is directly linked to the music. Good swing music support the dancers in making progress. Now the question is what do I understand by high [...]

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Handcrafted Internet Radio: 8tracks

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8tracks

Thanks to TheSwingDJ Trev from Perth I recently discovered a new internet radio called 8tracks. It was founded 2006 and went online on 8/8/2008. The concept of sharing and discovering music is simple. You create a mix – a mini playlist – with at least 8 tracks and/or you are listening to a mix, created by an user. How 8tracks describe their vision: 8tracks believes handcrafted music programming trumps algorithms. Think radio in the 1970s, mixtapes in the 1980s, and DJ culture of the 1990s through today. DJs share their talent in taste making, providing exposure for artists. Listeners get [...]

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