DJ Tutorial,How to structure your mix 

ellaskins, you sir are a hero, because i know some cocky dj's who think everyone's in there for himself, but you help beginning dj's by explaining all kinds of think from how to beatmatch, to how to scratch, ty so much

Dude, What a great and easy way to count bars. I always heard about counting 32/64 beats, but the term is actually bars. Then there's phrases... this makes all the sense in the world! Thanks again ! Jose A. Miami, Florida - USA

i watched this video a couple of months ago, and i had no idea what he was talking about..but im watching it right now and i completly understand everything. Thats wat Practise n Njoy-ing gets you!

You are great DJ.. I think there are few DJs around who want to teach the beginners but they do not think that they too were once like us .... i respect you, you are great ....

Started practising for a month when i've just bought my axis 4s and my vmx 200...you're the best teacher...thanks for inspiring me! ;) Cheers from Hungary!

youre the best teacher for anything dj perhaps in the world. thank you for youre thousands of videos

Thank you for posting this! paying attention to phrase lengths is something that few djs seem to focus on. too many times i've been grooving to a track and feeling the phrases and the next song cuts in halfway through a phrase killing the climax of a buildup. keep posting videos!

You are fabulous. You explain things so well. I will be following your videos for as long as you put them out. Thank you for being so thorough.

I noticed that on my own, but through knowing my tracks and intuition. Awesome and clear tutorial on the concept, kudos!

This was absolutely amazing mate. Massive props.

I always brought it in after every 64 bars. Worked it out for myself as a kid. I understood structure of songs as a young child. If you have to be taught it, you don't feel it, and youll always mix like a robot regardless.

i think this is a great tutorial for any dj starting out because understanindg the actual structure within in the beats makes a djs mix that much more smooth, took me awhile to get the hang of it, i could beat match perfectly fine but one day it just clicked ever since then its easy to see how tracks link up to a certain point and a nasty drop is imminet!

yo bro good work! your post is prob. the most helpful and thought out tutorial I've seen. thanks for all your help trying to make others become a better dj. hopefully we all thank you for your hard work and dedication to the music and teaching others become better Dj's.

to kakejelly, like a few people have said 99% of dance is quite well structured so just so long as you bring in the next toon in on time/ bar/phrase you will be fine , but this sort of mix is the kind of thing you would do for a pro cd.

first of all thanks for all the tutorials its down to you that i even know how to cue a track the way you explain things is just brilliant every dj should watch these videos because after a while every thing you teach becomes second nature and you dont even have to think about it and ultimatly we all become better djs cheeeers

man just wonderful! love your way of explaining and your straight and clear way of thinking and speaking! thanks for the tipps

I'm trying to be a Dj.. and this guy is really my hero!!!! and the worst part is that I'm not a native english speaker... but I understand the vidio and try to do my best thank you so much!

your the definition of passion bro, love your stuff

one of the best tutorials i've seen so far mate, keep up the good work :)

this makes perfect sense :D this is what mixing is all about i loved it when i tried to mix 2 tunes together without structuring it and it was just messy this guy has great knowledge and i respect him cheers john ;)

That is one of the best tutorials ever! Every sentence you said was just spot on and gave me all the facts! Are you a teacher?

I'm new to beatmixing. This is the best tutorial i've seen yet. thank-you :)

Man, that sounds so sweet! Awesome! Thanks so much for the tips. Your advice on structure is very sound, and right on. I'll keep on practicing and... enjoying! Cheers, mate!

Omg you are one off the best Technical Advisor ever, and your trick its simple, go back to the roots off the logic of music and practice and enjoy till your fullfill your own satisfaction great work almost finish to see all your vids and its to much !!!

You are an absolute inspiration to get into this. Thank you very much.

Great video and great advice thanks man. I going to go work on my pro mix now!

You're doing a great job at creating tutorial-videos! :D And I like how the place you're filming at just looks like your house is FULL of instruments and stuff :D each time another place and other stuff. Great!

So J, how can we take this advise and do this on the fly? What you construct in your bedroom, may not be what the crowd wants to hear, so how do you apply this in a live improv situation so you can be 100% free behind the decks playing to the crowd? I need big help with this.

OMFG AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!! I always tried doing this but could never figure it out how to line them properly

This is the part of being self tought that I ever got. But I'm learning. Great Video!

Great Tutorials man and quite entertaining to watch. Thumbs up!

i reckon this is the best way to learn, structure your mixes when your practicing... song selection is where your style fits in... EQing, lil bit of effects at the right time, diff creative ways to tranisition your mix, loops, samples thats what makes a good DJ... but that takes PRACTICE :) anyone can be a Dj, just takes alot of commitment, its how much your willing to keep at it, you can only get better everytime

i don't need help with my mixes.. but you're entertaining to watch nonetheless.. i appreciate the passion you put into what you do.. keep it up

to polqiu, time is fine too, 120 bpm so 120 beats in every min, 120/ 4 = 30 , so you could basicaly work out the structure by the timeing. j

this is what a medium dj should do if he wants to be a dj...a pro dj will do many more than this like a bit of delay and a change of key....But it is really a good and useful tutorial...

Question Jonathan....How come you prefer to count in groups of 4 rather than groups of 8? The music is so repetitive, it seems easier to think in groups of 8.

For electro house mixing....when you are playing a tune is it typically smoother to drop the first beat of 4 bars on another tune after or before the break in the song. So like beat on beat? 1rst beat on one tune and first beat on another, after the vocals have gone by on the first track. Im noticing that my mixes are smoother if I wait till all the vocals or breaks have passed by and drop the beat in when not much is going on in the song...Sorry if the question seems confusing.

very articulate! I like it said simple and understandable like you tell it. Nice work!

Hey, there, Jen. From what I hear, Numark's not so good (compared to, say, Pioneer or Denon). Still, I've used the Axis9's, and they're not bad at all. Love those large, rubbery buttons, and that feature that lets you go back to cue on the fly while the song's playing (by just pushing play again), which the others don't have. So, in short, it's not the cards you're dealt, but how you play 'em. Like he says: let's practice and enjoy! It's all about the fun.

great skills man, seriously. every video is great!

Are you trying to record your mixes? If so, you can run RCA cables out of your mixer into a soundcard that connects to your computer via a USB/Firewire cable. Then install a program on your computer to record what your mixing. Audacity is a free app and does a good job at recording. As for the soundcard, I'd start with an inexpensive one (Behringer U-CONTROL UCA202 USB-Audio Interface) and then upgrade if you want. such as a "Behringer U-CONTROL UCA202 USB-Audio Interface"

@mihranerniasyan actually if you carry a laptop with traktor or serato then you can take all of your songs with you anywhere and still play on cdjs or a vinyl turntable

Awesome vid, all your videos are good but this is by far the most important one. Every dj no matter what skill level must understand these principals.

Do you play drums as well? I see a pearl bassdrum I think(or am I really gone mad?)...

correct me if im confused, but isnt one of the songs in that mix "Make Your Move" by Dave Armstrong?

Does anyone have a link to ellas' live set? Be it audio or video (extra points for a soundcloud), I would love to listen to him do a full set as I'm sure it's amazing. These tutorials are amazing. Keep em coming!

@Archon349 Ummm... Actually vinyl is coming back with the development of programs/hardware such as Serato Scratch Live and Traktor, etc... With this technology the vinyl is used as a midi controller while still having the full control of vinyl... So... Yeah...

Thanks for the vid! I gave it a shot and came up with a decent mix. Cheers man!

i know it's an old video but, great help for the beginners! Thank You!!

I'm a drummer and i love the math aproach of music, you told well. Where can i find a "pro" mix from you?

How could you do this on the fly though? you'd have to know your tracks ridiculously well to go to a gig and do this on the fly unless you had a preplanned and pre set trackilst before hand, which I don't normally promote. Still, a good lesson to be teaching and a good thing to be remembering as well

jonathan you tell it how it is ...love ya vids man.....helped me loads dude safe bro

it seems to be pretty easy! ^^ love all your videos mate

Hay john, i dont understand why you count backwards on the second record....i get the concept of the phrases working together tho... good video......thanks Nat

Ill do a breakbeat mix now and structure it for 1-2 days, then Ill mix it hopefully the best way I can.

Please Please get back to me on this. I did my first Gig for this girls 18th birthday. Now I had her giving me a list of songs she wanted to be played. Now I did not play all the songs she wanted. Some of the songs I did have and some I didn't have. Now I wanted to play a lot more of the songs she had wrote down just I was so into my mix getting the crowd going I ran out of time. Should I more so focus on her choice of songs? or more so on the crowd and fit some of her songs in?

I would suggest to start with house, minimal, drum n bass or something that has more similar bpms and with less vocals on it. Hiphop its more difficult because there so many different bpms and lots of vocals on it

i think this is the best vid you have done!.

I continued it like that till the next DJ arrived at the club playing around 10-12 tracks. and my friend came to me and said he will teach me in 2 weeks to play completely on my own with out looking for help from other DJ... I provide my friend with music as he is a french one and I'm from India and we favor listening Indian music in the club.. He is a busy scheduled DJ and he can take rest while I learn as the club owners and manager are our friends, they let me play when the club is not full..

@ComatoseElf You have to adjust the pitch when you change the BPM of a song in VDJ to avoid distorting the sound. That's why he was making fun of people who use auto-sync.

Hi Johnathan how would i go about doing this during a mix?? Say if i just bought a song and hadn't had time to write everything down?

Ellaskins is so helpful, he's helped me become a better DJ

mate your videos are brilliant!

fantastic ellaskins thanks for all your vdos

what is he on about at 1:09 with 18 phrases?. does he mean that track on left deck has got 18 phrases in it? where has he gone back. can you explain it to me?

Thanks for the tutorial. It helped me a lot. I´ll practice!

Great advice. Well done tut

If you mix a new record in, right at the intro, over the outgoing record coming out of a break (on the first beat) WON'T it automatically match up bars and phrases?

You are on the ball dude, thanks.

Hi Ellaskins, I have a noobish question for i am a noob lol How do you count the phrases winding backwards???

Good video and good advice. Very applicable when doing full mixes for 10minmix not so but they are little bit more difficult imo and you need to be little more creative there.

very good stuff J. thanks.

That's how I do it also. I'll throw my tracks into Virtual DJ and keep watch on the breaks and such, then I'll take note on where to bring in the track. After that I'll fine tune it all on the actual decks and then I'll jot down the position of the pitch after I get it beat matched, so at the show, I'm all set and can focus on the crowd more. :P

Outstanding, totally on point!!

no i think this video is geared towards studio mixing; i.e. putting a lot of preparation into a mix and then recording the final result

Great teaching, best tutorial i have found

hey man I got my self a dj kit n i was just wondering if you could revire the pmx140 mixer just want do get your point of view on it thanx

@ComatoseElf I feel you on THAT man, most people can't afford a new DJ set when they start out, SO VDJ or software is the way to go, But people become a slave to the Sync button and never learn to really beat match by ear, more people mix with a computer because it takes the skill out of it.

Great video j. !

@redsox1024 You can't totally remove the drums but you can reduce how much they stand out by messing with the eq

Could you make a tutorial how to mix house songs on a laptop with virtual dj software??

you're awesome ''j'' you should think about producing you're own music aswell as mixing it for example get Ableton live it's good i have it

Really, how do you "see it"? Sorry, I started DJing with CDs and have moved onto the "laptop DJ" so I never really experience vinyl

Yes, for example you can use Traktor Dj Studio 3.

Whats a god cd setup to buy? I had vinyl but sold my decks. Thanks

really clear And understandable talking!

Johnathan is that Behringer mixer???

Man this is actually very good advice,where were you when I abandoned DJ'ing to go join the military?

@Archon349 hence... "vinyl is used as a midi controler..."

@somedude4321 It's definitely possible, but (in my opinion), you won't have nearly as much fun looking into a laptop screen while you are playing. If you can, practise with virtual dj, and save up to get something else. If you also work Traktor/Torq/Serato into it, as well as a nice midi controller, you will have the best of both worlds, and be able to do some pretty amazing stuff.

its tough, but after all the fucking up you become a master. This feels like a math class. Though he's essentially teaching what most djs eventually come to learn through practice, I think if someone started off using a tutorial like this they might get stressed out and give up!

as soon as I messed it up he gave me a serious look, I continued playing the second song, again I messed it up while changing between two songs (train wrecking this time) he came to me and said use the cue technique. as all the people left in the club are my friends I had no problem from the dance floor, I tried the cue technique for the next time and messed it a lot but not for too long. 4th time I played it a lot easier but beats are not matched

hi thanks for all your videos they are a big help

absolute legened. cheers mate.

Great Tutorial mate!!,... i'm from Indonesia,..can you give me other Tutorial,.thanks

Dude thank you for the tutorial videos!

i have just started djing and i have reached a problem. There are two tracks i'm playing but i only want the vocals and guitar from one and the drums from the other. I have got a dm950 for a mixer and two belt drive turntables......how do i do this

@DJInf3rn0Productions Yes, I agree with that. It's useful for mini-mixing. But some people feels like it's cheating, well, when you're not making a minimix. Even I think it's cheating.

Mad vids!!! Just curious, I wanna start mixin and need to now what its gunna set me back for a beginners kit kinda thing. Can someone help me out on what I need without breaking the budget?

thnx a lot for this this will deffintly help in plyng.....thnx