Music Management

[ThomasPM]

When i started djing properly last year i simply transferred my personal music library to my laptop and off i went!

It quickly became apparent that my taste in music wasn't to everyone's liking and i have added and added to my library as time has gone on.

As i am in the process of transferring my library to my new laptop i have decided to slim my library down as much as i can as i have a ridiculous amount of tracks although i am really apprehensive as sods law says as soon as i do i will no doubt get asked to play one of the tracks i have binned at a gig!

So my question to all you professionals is how do you manage your music library?

Is there such a thing as too much music?

Looking back at the year gone by and the gigs i have been doing mainly weddings and adult party's i would say that i would probably get away with less than 500 tracks would you agree?

[DeckstarDeluxe]

I wouldn't delete any of it personally unless memory is an issue (Don't get Lee started on wav's

It's important to categorise the music in a fashion it gets rid of the clutter and the deadwood without limiting yourself to the same old songs. Nobody else will be using your collection so it's all about how YOU view the music.

For me personally I have folders such as

70s - Generally stuff I wouldn't play but if I had a 50-60th birthday party I would be able to duck in and choose.
70s popular Generally tracks that would be suitable for weddings
70s rock Songs that I class as rock but maybe off the beaten path a bit (or ones worth exploring if rock/70s is working well)

In other years such as the 90s you had dance, indie/britpop and of course some genres as Motown aren't classed to me by year of release.

I find this way I can find the mainstream stuff pretty easily without having to go through loads of dross but the dross sometimes is what works...

[funkymook]

With massive staorage available you should be asking is there any reason not to have your complete music collection with you.

But duplicate tracks is one area where you can cut down without leaving anything out, and remixes (does anyone really need 8 remixes of the same track?).

Like most people I have folders with genres and styles, compile these in whatever way suits how you work. I also save playlists from previous gigs if they went particularly well or were unusual (in a good way). You’ll soon work out your own system.

[Benny Smyth]

With massive staorage available you should be asking is there any reason not to have your complete music collection with you.

But duplicate tracks is one area where you can cut down without leaving anything out, and remixes (does anyone really need 8 remixes of the same track?).

Like most people I have folders with genres and styles, compile these in whatever way suits how you work. I also save playlists from previous gigs if they went particularly well or were unusual (in a good way). You’ll soon work out your own system.

[ThomasPM]

I wouldn't delete any of it personally unless memory is an issue (Don't get Lee started on wav's

It's important to categorise the music in a fashion it gets rid of the clutter and the deadwood without limiting yourself to the same old songs. Nobody else will be using your collection so it's all about how YOU view the music.

For me personally I have folders such as

70s - Generally stuff I wouldn't play but if I had a 50-60th birthday party I would be able to duck in and choose.
70s popular Generally tracks that would be suitable for weddings
70s rock Songs that I class as rock but maybe off the beaten path a bit (or ones worth exploring if rock/70s is working well)

In other years such as the 90s you had dance, indie/britpop and of course some genres as Motown aren't classed to me by year of release.

I find this way I can find the mainstream stuff pretty easily without having to go through loads of dross but the dross sometimes is what works...

Yes some great ideas there Thanks Deckstar as i have struggled to think of ways to categorize my playlists which made it easy for me to find the tracks i want quickly i think i will now adopt two playlists for each Decade so for instance
60s pop 60s cool (Cool being the less well known stuff which works well at a disco)

With massive storage available you should be asking is there any reason not to have your complete music collection with you.

But duplicate tracks is one area where you can cut down without leaving anything out, and remixes (does anyone really need 8 remixes of the same track?).

Like most people I have folders with genres and styles, compile these in whatever way suits how you work. I also save playlists from previous gigs if they went particularly well or were unusual (in a good way). You’ll soon work out your own system.

I would like to keep my main library on my hardrive of my mac and as its only 256 ssd so i will be struggling with my current library but i do have two portable hard-drives i could use along side im just nervous about this as i have had issues in the past with virtual dj not being able to pick up my music files, iTunes in particular!

Duplicates yes i have loads some are part of house mixes so cant delete all i would have to go through each track individually which will be my top priority

[Nakatomi]

I try to restrict myself to radio/album versions plus one remix. In the case of most music reissued from the 90s the original version will always win.

Don't restrict yourself to just folders on the disk. If your software allows it, set up crates or playlists so that tracks can be part of more than one greater entity. For example, Cha Cha Slide lives in my '2000s' folder but is a member of the 2000s, cheese & action dances crates too. (also in my "cannot wait until I can delete it with a clear conscience" crate).

I'm working on splitting my decades crates into subcategories to help with the inevitable brain freezes which sometimes happen.

Music exists in my world as only single tracks. Album context is irrelevant to me as a DJ. Very often I'll strip out all but the artist, title & year tags (which btw I always change to the year it was first released wherever I can). I won't use tracks from continuously mixed albums at all, and I'm forever finding 'special' versions from compilations which don't measure up to the better known alternative.

[ThomasPM]

I try to restrict myself to radio/album versions plus one remix. In the case of most music reissued from the 90s the original version will always win.

Don't restrict yourself to just folders on the disk. If your software allows it, set up crates or playlists so that tracks can be part of more than one greater entity. For example, Cha Cha Slide lives in my '2000s' folder but is a member of the 2000s, cheese & action dances crates too. (also in my "cannot wait until I can delete it with a clear conscience" crate).

I'm working on splitting my decades crates into subcategories to help with the inevitable brain freezes which sometimes happen.

Music exists in my world as only single tracks. Album context is irrelevant to me as a DJ. Very often I'll strip out all but the artist, title & year tags (which btw I always change to the year it was first released wherever I can). I won't use tracks from continuously mixed albums at all, and I'm forever finding 'special' versions from compilations which don't measure up to the better known alternative.

I am going to do the same as its does get confusing having different versions of the same song im going to put all my 90s house compilations on a separate drive and just keep unmixed versions for Djing i remember playing a version of Robin S show me love that has gat decor passion mixed into it at the end i then had to try mix the next track in with the other two tunes playing what a dissaster

I have never used crates as i dont really understand how they work but it is something i need to look at as i have noticed the option in serato and virtual dj

Cha cha slide i am always amazed at how popular that track is it has never failed to fill the dance floor young and old people seem to love it

So thats me busy for the next few weeks ill be at the kitchen table working on my playlists and track info while the Mrs watches rubbish on TV (I have banned Hollyoaks as of january the 1st the biggest load of ever)

it will be a long overdue exercise for me

Thanks for the pointers

[Nakatomi]

Crates are just a 'soft' method of categorising your music into 'boxes'. Like having a track in multiple folders but without the file duplication

[Jim - Scotland's Party DJ]

Never knew that about crates.

I always thought it was just an arsey way of saying "folders"

You probably could get away with 500 tunes (80%+ of my requests or for the same handful of songs that I'd probably play anyway) but if you've got the space I don't see the point in downsizing as there's always that one time someone will ask for something really obscure you chucked and it would have made their night to hear it for once.

Mine are all in reasonably big folders:

50s - 00s mix (general stuff nothing too heavy or dancey)
Cheese
Dance
RnB
Rat Pack
Scottish
Top 40 (pretty much anything "modern" that doesn't fit into rnb, cheese or dance)
rock
indie
slow
soul

There's a couple more but those are pretty much what I use as the back bone of every gig. IMO the plus side of having them in big folders is it's much easier to come across a forgotten classic or something cool that will work with the next tune but you might not have thought of.