Going from 2 channel to a 4 channel mixer :D !

[*G*.~JerryMoon]

Hey everyone!

I bought the VMS4 and traktor 2 during the fall but since the site went down I havn't been able to able to post anything aboutit but I did want to ask everyone who uses a 4 channel mixer what kind of techniques do you have for utilizing more than two tracks all I've been able to come up with is grabbing a loop or using a vocal sample form a third track to play while I'm mixing the other two songs but I do want to make my mixing a bit more dynamic I also want to get into mixing more than one track at a time.

I know it seems a little long winded but please share some of your techniques its hard to pick up on what dj's are doing by just watching them live

[Adzm00]

It takes ages to multi track mix. There are all sorts of techniques, and like mixing two tracks, its different depending on what tracks you are putting together. If you are playing tracks on top of each other, rather than just looping, keeping track of the phrase of each track is pretty important. Also be careful and use the eq's to your advantage to make sure things don't sound too messy.

I can't really give you set techniques because there are no "rules". Creating your own builds, risers, percussion loops is a good way of adding to your sets and can be brought in on the additional channels.

[Jason Cerna]

i tried the 3 deck and 4 deck stuff, but the different genres i play don't really cater to that style. so, i have made a comprimise. decks a and b are my main decks. c is my scratch, loops and vocals deck. deck d is the sample deck where i trigger additional samples to layer with. with my midi fighter in 4 banks mode, i can make use of different decks with both hands. my crossfader is only mapped to deck c for scratching purposes. the other decks i can just pop in and out of with the upfaders.

*note, the parameters on my effects aren't setup correctly.

[Hausgeist]

Another nice thing about having at least a third deck is ability to drop tracks faster. Even if you are not always playing all your tracks simultaneously, you can keep two going for quite a while. In addition to what Adzm00 said, another caveat is to pay close attention your levels. Volume spikes can get out of hand quickly.

[*G*.~JerryMoon]

Awesome thanks guys!!!! I appreciate the help I'm about to start up traktor and have some fun and thank you Jason Cerna I usually use just the upfaders and keep my cross fader unassigned but I might start throwing in some scratches or one shots with that

again appreciate the help guys that you