I mix lots of genres of music for contras. The only track I’ve ever called without mixing was the first release of Mika’s “Big Girl (You Are Beautiful)” on Cartoon Motion. It goes 7x through so it was a real short dance but a nice filler with a no-walkthrough dance. Everything else needs work. I only pick tracks that have clear 8-beat phrasing most of the time. If I can I move the parts with indistinguishable phrases towards the end of the mix once the dancers know the dance well. Alternatively I add a beat track to enhance the beats and phrasing. I rarely mix by simple copy and paste, which allows me to do creative stuff to ensure phrases are spot on. (“This is Halloween” from The Nightmare Before Christmas was true to its name, a nightmare with a few slipped phrases of 9 or 7 beats, but I *made* it to work.) So it’s being selective, doing often heavy editing, and many other bits n bobs that are in my secret sauce. I rarely try for AABB squaring since that can wreck the original music too much. One still must count (I cheat: I perform from my mixing app which has the phrase markings for me.) \Bob callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote: callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote: AABB. If mixed, the only thing you can count on is 8-beat phrases. ... knowledgeable DJ, hasn't vetted the tracks? genres that aren't made for phrased dancing will not necessarily follow strict 8-beat phrasing. For instance ... few bars of guitar strums--and not always the same number--while trying to remember the first line of the next verse. While I haven't gone looking for examples, I'd be surprised if such variable inter-verse vamping didn't sometimes appear even on studio recordings. straight tunes and wildly crooked tunes, there are also tunes that are mostly straight but have an occasional odd phrase. Even medleys of straight tunes can sometimes have some extra beats at the transitions between tunes, as heard around 0:59 in this video: beats, but exceptions are hardly unusual. Also, in order to fit recordings that were made for listening and not specifically for dance routines, line-dance step sheets may prescribe various irregularities in the routines. Here are just a few of the examples a little searching turned up: https://www.learn2dance4fun.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Boot-Scootin-Boo… > Boot Scootin’ Boogie > 38 count, 4 wall, beginner line dance https://www.copperknob.co.uk/stepsheets/every-little-honky-tonk-ID132260.as… Tags 24... chunks of 8 beats (or eight bars of triple meter), try listening to any of these while tapping your foot or fingers and counting along: techno music than I am: If you play a random track not already "vetted" for phrasing, if you find a place where there's sufficiently discernible phrasing to establish a starting point for your "mental metronome of 8 counts" (to quote Donna Hunt), if you use that mental metronome to carry you through a part where phrasing is less evident, and if you then get to another part with findable phrasing, how reliably (or not) can you expect that the phrases will still line up with your mental eight-counts? _______________________________________________ List Name: Callers mailing list List Address: Callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net Archives: https://www.mail-archive.com/callers@lists.sharedweight.net/