THE BPM BLOG

I had the pleasure of DJing at the Liebrary Bar again this past Saturday. As always, it was a fun night.

If you need a little something to listen to, here is my DJ set from the evening (actually, it’s the first hour and a half or so – using real vinyl as well as Serato.)

Hope you like it. Some of the lyrics are explicit (since it was a bar setting) so keep that in mind when listening to it cranked up in your cubicle at work.

Below are links to the audio recorded live at the 2009 West Central High School Winter Formal in Hartford, SD. The night is split up into 2 parts, but both parts have a lot of good Top-40, Country, and even Classic Rock.

Enjoy!

Part 1
Part 2

I had the pleasure of DJing for this great group of High School students again this last weekend.

Here’s the video from the night:

This past Saturday, I DJed the Vermillion High School Winter formal – it was actually my 5th year in a row DJing this dance.

Once again, the students were awesome! They danced the night away, made great requests, and were very respectful and polite.

I recorded the audio from the night and posted the links to it below. It’s a good mix of Top-40, Hip-Hop, Country, Alternative, and Oldies.

Vermillion Dance Part 1
Vermillion Dance Part 2
Vermillion Dance Part 3

It’s hard to believe it’s already December. As I look out my kitchen window this morning, I see a thin layer of snow on the ground, with more to come soon. Since it’s been awhile since I my last post, I thought that this would be the perfect morning to sit down with a cup of coffee and update the ol’ blog.

My wedding season officially ended for the year in late October, but I’m still keeping busy with company parties, school dances, and nights at the Liebrary Bar in Sioux Falls. In early November, I DJed a birthday party in Wagner, SD which was my first gig on the reservation. The week after that, my wife and I got away for a week and recharged our batteries on a beach in Mexico.

Warming our tootsies in Mexico

After we got back, I had a weekend off, then traveled up to Huron, SD the next weekend for a smaller company Christmas party complete with Karaoke. Even though it was a relatively small crowd, the party was still a lot of fun – especially toward the end when I had the opportunity to break out a lot of my classic rock records for the “older” crowd (CCR, Boston, Eagles, etc.)

This Saturday, I’m heading down to Vermillion, SD once again to DJ the High School Winter Formal. This is actually the 5th year in a row that I am DJ’ing this particular dance. It should be a lot of fun – Vermillion is definitely one of my favorite schools to DJ at. After that – next Friday (the 11th) I’ll be DJing down at the Liebrary in Sioux Falls, followed by another school dance in Hartford, SD that Saturday, I’m really looking forward to both of these events.

Anyway, here is a video of the company party that I DJ’ed this past Saturday:

A couple of weekends ago, I didn’t have a wedding reception on a Saturday night (had one Friday though) and had a chance to go down to the Liebrary Bar in Sioux Falls and spin some tunes.

As a result, I now have 4 hours of live DJ mixing for you and your ipod to enjoy! I do have to warn you, some of the lyrics are explicit – so don’t go cranking this up in your cubicle at work (use headphones instead!)

I also need to give a big shout-out to DJ Kor aka Jeff Meuzelaar for stopping by after his wedding and snapping the above TwitPic!

Here are the mixes (left click to listen, or right click to “save target as”)

Liebrary Bar Mix pt 1
Liebrary Bar Mix pt 2
Liebrary Bar Mix pt 3
Liebrary Bar Mix pt 4

Download Links:
Gertsen Reception Part 1
Gertsen Reception Part 2
Gertsen Reception Part 3
Gertsen Reception Part 4

Most of the wedding receptions that I DJ include at least some, if not all of the typical wedding events and dances. Sometimes, however, I DJ wedding receptions where the bride and groom choose to forgo the “typical” wedding fanfare and have a memorable evening consisting of dancing to great songs. Quite often, these songs are presented to me in the form of a “Request List”. The challenging part for me is deciding how to arrange and structure the songs so that the dancefloor stays packed and everyone has a good time.

This past Saturday I had a wedding reception at the Minnehaha Country Club in Sioux Falls. The bride and groom (wonderful, wonderful couple) wanted to have their first dance be the only “special” event. No parent dances, no bouquet toss, no dollar dance, etc. They also gave me a request list with many of the “standard” wedding reception songs on the “do not play” list.

Included on the “Do Not Play List”:

Adams, Bryan Summer Of ‘69
Archies Sugar, Sugar
Big & Rich Save A Horse (Ride A Cowboy)
Cyrus, Miley See You Again
Hammer, M.C. U Can’t Touch This
Joel, Billy Piano Man
Loggins, Kenny Footloose
Los Del Rio Macarena
Nickelback How You Remind Me
Nickelback Photograph
Nickelback Rockstar
Quad City DJ’s C’mon ‘N Ride It (The Train)
Rednex Cotton Eye Joe
Savage Garden Truly Madly Deeply
Sir Mix-A-Lot Baby Got Back
Smith, Will Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It
Sorta Crackers Band Chicken Dance
Tone Loc Funky Cold Medina
Village People YMCA
Travolta, John & Olivia Newton-John Grease Megamix
Vanilla Ice Ice Ice Baby

I spent a lot of time studying their list and choosing a song order that would work best. I also took a few requests from guests throughout the evening. The result was an amazing night of dancing to an eclectic mix of music. I recorded the entire evening and split it up into four parts available to download. I would say that 90% of the songs were “beatmixed” and I even mixed quite a few of them “harmonically” (same key or progressing keys.) The download links are at the top of this post.

Moral of the story: It’s important for a DJ to be versatile. Any DJ can get out on the dancefloor and set up the Chicken Dance, or throw their hands in the air to form the letters Y-M-C-A, but when the bride and groom don’t want to do any of that stuff at their reception, what do you do?? Well, a good DJ lets the music speak for itself, and arranges it in such a way that everyone dances the night away and leaves the reception with a ton of great memories!

The entire playlist can be viewed here.

Here’s an example of the eclectic music I played at the reception.

Part 1
Into The Mystic – Van Morrison
September – Earth Wind and Fire
Van Morrison – Domino
I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch) – The Four Tops
Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough (Single Version) – Michael Jackson
Clash – Rock the Casbah
Al Greene – Let’s Stay Together
STAYIN’ ALIVE – BEE GEES
Wilson Picket – Mustang Sally
We Are Family – Sledge
Lets Dance – David Bowie
Rock With You (Single Version) – Michael Jackson
Miss You – The Rolling Stones
I Only Want to Be with You – Shelby Lynne
Baby, I Need Your Lovin’ – Four Tops
1999 – Prince
You Look Good In My Shirt – Keith Urban
Lady Madonna – Beatles
Brick House – Commodores
More Than A Woman – The Bee Gees
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun – Cyndi Lauper
Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive
Cry To Me – Solomon Burke
Oh! Darling – The Beatles

Here’s a video from a wedding reception that I DJ’ed Memorial Day weekend in Chamberlain, SD at the AmericInn.

Great crowd!

This video was put together by Jeff at Musical Edge from the SE Tech dance that we “tag-teamed.” Good times!

Last Thursday, the 30th of April, Jeff Muezelaar (Musical Edge) and I DJ’ed a dance at SE Technical Institute. We combined some of our equipment and took turns mixing the music throughout the night.

The dance started off slow, but by the end of the night, there was a pretty decent crowd there. Jeff and I are complete DJ dorks, so naturally we had a great time DJ’ing together.

Anyway, here’s a video I put together from footage I recorded that night (mostly of Jeff, I’m only at the beginning and at the end.)