I was chatting to a dancer at an event recently while I was waiting to begin my DJ slot. It turned out that she assumed that DJs have a pre-prepared set list which we play and maybe tweak a little as we go along.
Most of the DJs I know don’t use pre-prepared lists and certainly Lindy Jazz DJs me and Andy don’t. Instead we choose what we are going to play “on the fly” responding in real time to the energy in the room, the mood and previous DJ choices. You will see us watching the floor with our earphones on sifting through our music collection choosing the best track to play next. Quite often we will choose the next track and then change our mind literally seconds before it is due to start and replace it with something better!