Music Is Life - Live It Up

Music is a magical gift we must cultivate and nourish. Casals says music fills him up with the wonders of life and the incredible marvel of being a human. Berstein says it is enriching and ennobling. Music teaches us to appreciate the wonders of life.

Music builds up the skills of creativity, cooperation and communication and helps us to see the world from a new prospective. We are introduced to the myriad rhythms, richness and diversity of human life. Music has a great power of bringing the world together.

In today’s busy and hectic world people young and old look for an opportunity to chase away their blues with good music. There is a variety of music available in the market these days. You can even download music from the net on to your computers and from there to your mobiles. No family function or gathering is complete without a good DJ system - everyone dances together enjoying themselves for hours. Music and a good voice are God’s gifts to humans. Even animals have now been proven to respond to music.

A disc jockey or a DJ is a person who selects and plays prerecorded music for an audience. In 1934 American commentator Waller Winchell coined the term "disc jockey" the combination of "disc" and "jockey" which is the operator of a machine.

In 1943 Jimmy Savile launched the world’s first DJ dance party playing Jazz records in England. In 1947 he became the first DJ to use twin turntables for continuous play.

In 1947 the "Whiskey-a-go-go" night club opened in Paris, France, considered to be the world’s first discotheque or disco deriving its name from the French word, meaning a nightclub where the featured entertainment is recorded music rather than an onstage band.

There are several types of disc jockeys –

Radio jockey – They introduce and play music that is broadcasted on AM, FM, shortwave or digital stations.

Club Jockey- Select and play music in a bar, club, disco or a rave.

Hip hop jockeys- They select and play music with multiple turntables with one or more backup.

MCs Reggae disc jockeys- In Reggae, the DJ is a vocalist raps, beat boxes or chats over digital music recording.

Mobile disc jockeys- They travel with a portable sound system and play at a variety of functions like birthday parties, marriages, and a variety of other events.

DJ equipments:

-The music recording is done in a DJ preferred medium eg. Vinyl records, compact discs, computer media files.

-A minimum of two devices to play sound recording for alternate back and forth to create continuous playback of music.

-A sound system for amplification of or broadcasting of the music.

-A DJ mixer, an electronic two channel mixer with a cross mixer with a crossfader to go from one song to another.

-Headphones used to play one recording while the other is being played to the audience.

-A Microphone so that the DJ can introduce songs and speak to the audience.

Several techniques are used by DJs as means to better mix prerecorded music like cueing, audio mixing of two or more sound sources. Club DJs use turntable techniques like cutting, scratching, needle drops etc. In part two of this article we will learn more about music.