I get many questions asking if I can teach you to beat juggle.
I have never practiced beat juggling to any great level, besides the basics. I love scratching so much, that is always what I wanted to do and did anytime I was on the turntables. I also started to learn juggling regular fader, then switched my scratching over to hamster and at the time I was totally confused, because everyone I knew was juggling regular.
So I intentionally chose not to study the beat juggling element of turntablism, even though I have a deep respect and appreciation for it, especially when done well.
With that in mind, I’ll stick to what I am best at and let others with those skills and the ability to teach you guide you properly.
Here are the videos I recommend you watch to help you get started beat juggling:
Resource 1 – DJ Angelo
Lessons:
- Beat Juggling Basics (part 1 Of 2)
- Beat Juggling Basics (part 2 Of 2)
- Beat Juggling (using Loops)
- Beat Juggling (with Pauses)
- Beat Juggling (chasing / Strobing)
- Trick Mixing
Resource 2 – DJ X2k of The Scratcher’s Journal
Make sure you visit the full tutorial at x2k.co.uk/beat-juggling-tutorials (archived version) for the full lesson breakdowns in text that accompany these videos.
Lessons:
- What is beat juggling?
- Marking your Records for a Juggle.
- Looping a section of a beat using 2 copies of a record.
- Tapping a record causing it to slow down.
- Phasing.
- Doubling and Echoing.
- Tripling.
- Strobing (aka Chasing).
- Shuffle Strobing.
- The Broken Chase.
- Pattern 1.
- The one, two patten.
Other resources & advice
If you love beat jugging, my best advice is to watch everything you can related to the topic. Watch the famous routines and juggles. Then practice practice practice.
5 time World DJ Champion Vekked sums it up way better than I could in this post:
“If I had to attribute my success in battling to anything, it would be how much time I put into studying the history. I’ve seen/heard every DMC World Final, I own nearly every ITF world final and hemisphere final, as many NMS battle as I could get my hands on… and despite VHS being long irrelevant by the time I started battling, I have stacks of battle and turntablist VHS tapes and a VCR because that was the only medium that a lot of battle history existed on.
Guys like Jazzy Jeff, Cash Money, Aladdin, Cheese, Cut Master Swift, Steve Dee, the X-men, ISP, the Beat Junkies… Those are our Beethovens, Mozarts, Bachs, they created the art form and the only way to know how to get to the next level is knowing how they took it to the level they did.
Just as a little anecdote, the ending snare pattern from my “Do I Have To Tell You That You’re Wack” routine where I use my right hand on both the mixer and turntable simultaneously to go faster than I normally could was inspired directly from DJ Cash Money and Patrick P-Trix Arriola (Bust A Move, ITF 99). I saw each of them do it in different routines, and I realized that because I beat juggle hamster I had to move even less than they did in order to do it so it was even easier for me and I could do it wayyy faster than I could normally loop record. If I didn’t study these guys as hard as I did I would never have came across that technique. That’s just one example of SO many times I’ve seen something from an old set where I’ve been like “hmm, maybe I can push that technique further now that X technology exists that didn’t at the time these guys were doing it”. Know where you came from to know where you’re going!!”
If you spot some great beat juggling resources that you think would be great to share please email them to me at hello@schoolofscratch.com
Happy Beat Juggling! 😀
– Emma Short-E