If You are DJ, How do you organize your music files?

[levalencia]

Just If any Djs around here I 'd like to know how you organize music files and folders.

I organiza them by Month, CD

MARCH 2010
CD1
CD2

APR 2010
CD1
CD2

On each folder I organize them by KEY and BPM

Thx

[tranced34]

I don't use Mp3 CDs, I follow Armin's advice on keeping one track per CD (excluding all those tunes that have remixes of course!). Have them ordered by key, using Camelot systems e.g. 1A/1B, 2A/2B etc. this does require a clear out every once in a while but hardly a problem!

[levalencia]

I dont use mp3 cds, just audio CDS, but you are saying one track by CD? thats a waste of space! even for me as a novice DJ I would need about 5 CD WALLETS to carry all my music that way.

[Rodri Santos]

I only organize my cds according to the key, but not the camelot number because 3% pitch without key lock = previous/next key and with beatlock it's about 5% and the camelot system doesn't give you a real clue about this, i've the wheel printed in the back of my cd wallet though

And about the tracks , having only 1 on each cd it's a real waste, having 50 mp3 on each cd it's a crazyness for 2 reasons:

- Even good cdjs like old cdj1000 don't read mp3 so you could eventually be at the booth, people expectating and.... you can't play anything.

- You'll have a pure mess, i have a cd with commercial crap with 30 mp3 tracks and i've needed some time to learn the order of the tracks, this is only to throw at the beginning waiting until 1pm :P

What i do:

Wav files only from 320kbps or higher mp3/wav and 5-10 tracks i don't write the full name. Only keywords but if the name will fill a lot of space i record less tracks.

For example Aly & Fila - Khepera (original mix) i only write

5.- Khepera (F#m)

And i already know it's 140 bpm so i keep it almost as neat as with 1 track but have more tracks on the cd

Ideally what AvB does it's the best thing, but being realistic it's expensive , a waste and you'll have to carry a minimum of ~50 cds for a 2 hour set...

[Alex E]

9 tracks on a cd, 2 copies of each cd. Use a cd-printer to get proper readable text on them. Format and order: Key - BPM - Artist - Title incl. remix (Year).

That's how I'd work. But... I have CDJ400's, and only work with USB sticks.

[levalencia]

Rodri I have a couple of quiestions for u

I have read about the camelot system since a year ago but it seems the KEYS are only 1-12 and (a-b), but there are many other keys?

Can you please explain me about it? How do you detect the key? I use Mixed in Key but as I say it only detects the one I told you

I also use platinum notes which gives pitch correction amongs other things

[hungdeejay]

I burn 1 track per CD and sort by Key - Tempo - Artist - Track Name then I write key, tempo, artist, track name on the CD. I don't think it's a waste because actually you don't need to bring too much music along, just prepare well before a gig, bring only what you really like to play that day and what really fits the vibe that day. Around 150-180 CDs is enough for me.

[levalencia]

Nice Hung, thats a good point, but it would mean that you would need to have at home, another 1000 CDS collected right? and each time you go to a party you would have to organize what would u play or not, getting out some cds, puttin some others in, nop?

Thanks

Does never organize music per year¡? month?, for me its important to have the latest cds at the last part of my cd wallet so I can play the newest songs if I want!

[hungdeejay]

Yes. I've burnt 1500-2000 CDs for the last 2 years and I do sort them by month and place the latest tracks first in the wallet as you said. Before a gig, I think about what I want to play and what the audience want and then getting some in and out. It works fine for me.

[lobitxo]

i thniks first by genre then by artist

[KrisA]

don't really "organize" them tbh

two cd's per 9-11 tracks, not organized by genre, artist or alphabetical order. Tagged with key and bpm though.

[aki]

music > genre > year > [artist - title].wav
fully tagged, bpm and waveform tags added in denon database, usually sorting via genre on my players. (harddrive players ftw)