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Music selection is a very important part in preparation for a winning routine. Many athletes and coaches are going to a great deal in researching, mapping, planning and budgeting in order to obtain the best music possible during production. I have had the pleasure to work with some great coaches over the years and it was very rewarding to see their efforts paying off during the presentation of the medals to their athletes.
Finding the right music.
Most athletes that I know are selecting music that has a strong beat, that is easy to follow, has a great NRG level, plenty of high and low sections and it also has a catchy rhythm. These are some factors that you may need to take in consideration when you are looking for a music piece. Aerobics music services such as the Music & Motion Studio are a great place to start with if you are not sure which music you want to use or you want to know what the latest Hi NRG tunes are. Internet also is a great place to do some research on music.
Know what the music requirements are.
This is an area that is overlooked by quite few coaches and athletes. Please make sure that you know precisely the timing requirements for the event that you are attending. I have been in world aerobic events and the athletes and coaches that were representing some countries had produced their music shorter or longer than the timing requirements of the event. Also there are events that are requiring a certain BPM range that the music needs to fall in.
Mapping the music.
Mapping the music that you select can be done in few different ways. The best way in my opinion is to pick up a pad and a pen and divide your music in different sections from beginning to end. This way you will gain an excellent idea of how the piece of music that you choose is structured and which are the best parts of it to use. You can identify the flat and strong sections of the song, and also lyrics positions. This will make much easier for you to understand the song's structure and will also save you money when production time comes. Finally you can divide the song in bars and beats that you'll want to use for the routine that you're choreographing.
VISUAL EXAMPLE ON MAPPING TO FOLLOW: (Please check back later)
Once you have finished mapping the music and selected all the pieces that you'll want to use it is then a time to prepare yourself for the production of the music.
BPM
This is an extremely important area that sometimes gets overlooked or is misunderstood. First of all you will need to identify the BPM of the song. The easiest way to do this is to pick up a stopwatch and start playing the music form the very first strong beat. Count the beats for 60 seconds and you'll have a very good idea of what the BPM of that song is.
Please keep in mind that when the BPM of the song changes the duration of the song changes too. For instance a 5 minutes song that is 120 BPM will become 3 minute and 52 seconds in length when is sped up to 155 BPM .
High BPM Low NRG level VS Low BPM High NRG Levels (This will be updated soon. Please check back later)
Edits
Look at your mapping sheet and see how many different parts you will be using in the song. If you will need to use 5 different parts of the song then the song needs to be edited in 10 different points. You will need to allow roughly around 5 minutes per edit point during the production. This will include the identification process, marking, editing and mixing for each point. Be very careful of which points you choose to blend together as there are cases where the edits are simply impossible to perform. A good example of this is editing between vocal passages and when the rhythm of the music shifts from low to high or vice versa.
Mixing multiple songs
-Music selection. Choosing which tracks can go together.
-How the pro's do it. Beat matching-Key mixing.
Selecting songs that will match each other in a competition cut is rather challenging if you aren't familiar with music keys and styles. The easiest way to determine if two tracks can mix to each other is by making a note of the song's "Key Signature" as there are key categories that will mix together well and will present a "natural flow" in to each other. But even if the key is matched perfectly this does not guarantee that the songs will mix together well if the parts that you choose to use are not creating a "perfect harmony".
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