Dj: From Jukebox To Artist

Many people will argue that DJing is not an art, that all DJs do is string together other artists' work and claim it as their own. They argue that anyone with some sense of rhythm and a few technical skills can easily be a DJ. Is it really that easy? A DJ is more than a human jukebox. What is a DJ exactly? There are two types actually, the radio DJ and the club DJ. Radio DJs are the announcers you hear on the radio in between songs. They introduce songs and chat conversationally to entertain the listeners. Club DJs are the people who play vinyl records or CDs live in dance nightclubs.

Many people are attracted to the DJ profession because of glamour, popularity and wealth. Because of this, many DJs in the business do not have a love and appreciation for the music. In Southern California alone, hundreds of club DJs exist, but there are only a handful of good ones. So what makes a good DJ? I believe DJs are a special breed. Good DJs do not hear music like ordinary people. Every song has its own energy. A DJ's job is to manipulate this energy to affect the mood of the crowd. A good DJ knows how to control the crowd by reading the emotion of the room and directing that energy by choosing the right songs to play. "By dramatically emphasizing the connections between songs, by juxtaposing them or by seamlessly overlaying them, the modern club DJ is not so much presenting discrete records as combining them to make something new.