By Ron (Ron) on Monday, January 29, 2001 - 04:54 pm: EditI've had this idea for a long time and I thought I'd throw it out for comment.
As a DJ, its pretty hard to figure out what songs people like. The really bad ones clear the floor, the really good ones people run over to the DJ booth to ask you about, or they clap for. Certain popular ones get requested a lot.
I make a lot of CDs for people and sometimes I get feedback on them, but not usually specifically. (By the way, folks, don't leave those CDs in the heat of your car, the sticker label will come off). I can sometimes tell if people like songs by how fast the floor fills, how many people are still on the sides, or their energy or expressions during the song. I also get input from other swing DJs on good songs/artists.
But outside of that, its pretty hard to tell. The people who generally liked the music might compliment you at the end of the evening, the people who generally didn't like the music will either stay away, or complain the next day on the forum. But its hard to tell which songs they liked or disliked. People just get a general sense of satisfaction or disatisfaction. I do, too, when I dance to other DJs. Its hard to get specific.
Usually, I start from a base of songs that I've prescreened to be good to dance to, (that are obviously biased to be in my areas of preference) and then I try them out, see how they go over (if I can tell at all, also biased by me), and then play the better of those more often, while still including ones that I didn't think were so great to provide variety, and because I'm often wrong.
So here's the idea: Have a swing music evaluation night. I bring some CDs, or make a CD or two of songs that I want input on, and I make a little form with the list of songs and space for ratings (1 to 5) and comments. At someone's house, like Michaels (what do you think, Michael?), I play a song, or part of a song, people dance or listen to it, and at the end of every song, people spend 15 seconds rating and commenting on that song, then I play the next one. Oh, and at the end of the night, I could give away
Its a lot more work for me to do this, which is why I've hesitated to suggest it. And it has the obvious major problem of how to get a representative group. The advanced and more hard-core dancers would probably be over-represented. So the results would probably be skewed against what beginners like. And if there were a lot of groovy lovers in the group, the results would be similarly biased. And people won't feel the same about a song in Michael's living room as they would at the end of a night of dancing at the Firehouse.
And it won't solve diversity arguments. There is no magic mix that satisfies everyone. People want at least 2/3rds of the night to be their preferred music. If its only 1/3, they won't really notice it, and they'll have a unsatisfying night. 2/3 + 2/3 + 2/3 = impossible.
But at least I could get some idea if people like the Joe Williams song I've dug up, or a new tune from Johnny Boyd. Or it might help to find the groovy tunes that the big-band lovers hated the least, and vice-versa. Or I could see if people like any of the lounge songs I generally stay away from. I could just take the results as more input along with the other inputs.
I'd have to find a night, a place, and people willing to do this, in exchange for:
o having some influence over what they hear in our swing venues
o possibly winning a free CD
o having wine and food with some cool people after the evaluation is over
Any comments?
...or do those other things we had planned. ;) 
