Today we’re cross-posting some content from our good friend Peter Kirn’s CreateDigitalMusic.com.
Some notes from the Art of the DJ/Digital Mixing session at WMC: Five out of Seven Panelists Use PowerBooks. Read More…
Miami — One of the most interesting parts of the electronic music revolution is the digital convergence. An industry once steeped in vinyl is gradually turning to digital technology. At a panel “Art of the DJ/Digital Mixing” DJs and producers discussed switching from traditional analog equipment (turntables and a mixer) to digital technologies (i.e. software). Panelists include: Greg “Stryker” Chin, AJ Bertenshaw, DJ Skribble, Josh Gabriel, Jay Dabhi and Cyril Palacios. Joe Vangeri was the moderator.
A lot of the panel discussion centered on turntables vs. digital music. Some of the most interesting nuggets from the panel are that five out of seven use Mac OS X. Josh Gabriel extolled the virtues of using Ableton‘s Live and performs using only his PowerBook laying a plexiglas panel over the turntables at the clubs because there’s “not even three inches of space for a laptop.” Everyone agreed that the capabilities of tools like Live and Final Scratch were worth the initial investment in time to archive all your music.
Some of the tips from the session on archiving your vinyl to digital included:
– Encode your vinyl in the highest bit rate you can. Most panelists preferred 320 kbps, but will work with a well-encoded 192 kbps file when necessary.
– When converting your vinyl it is imperative that you use good needles (club, DJ and scratch needles are all bad). Use an archival quality needle like the Stanton 890 FS. Bertenshaw, recommended the high-fidelity needles from Sure for around US$200.
– Encode using a good analog to digital (A>D) converter, not the built-in sound card in your PC. It all comes down to budget, with things like the Apogee converter at the high end.
