ABOUT DJ ANTO

I started DJing in 2008 and I regularly DJ in different locations across the UK - such as London, Nottingham and Glasgow. I am also the resident DJ for the Edinburgh Tango Society. I DJ every Sunday at the Counting House, Edinburgh, 8-11pm.

I am also an event organiser: Thomas Meyer and I organise El Tango Club, a monthly milonga in Edinburgh. We also organise the ETS Edinburgh Festivalito.

About my DJing

My music

I play traditional music - from the late twenties' to the Golden age of Tango - mid thirties to the early fifties. I have a large music collection, with a selection of over 10,000 tracks.

I believe the Tango DJ is an entertainer, not an educator. Although I like to sometimes surprise my audience with beautifully danceable gems, the dancers can always rely on a selection solidly based on the traditional repertoire. Amongst my favourite orchestras are D'Arienzo, Di Sarli, Troilo and Canaro - with the beautiful voice of Roberto Maida.

I work hard on my music collection - although it never feels like hard work - listening to my music, so that when I am DJing I can pay attention to the dance floor and focus on the dancers. Sound quality is very important - my collection is almost entirely saved in lossless format. I spend most of my time improving my collection by searching for better versions of tangos I already have in my library. 

In the last few years I worked hard to improve my technical knowledge around sound systems by attending a tailored sound engineering course with Basesound.

I have recently began to explore the world of tango vinyls and have developed a small collection.

My tech

I DJ using a MacBook Pro running Megaseg Pro. I usually edit my collection on iTunes and then transfer it across into Megaseg Pro. Megaseg Pro is very reliable and flexible. Although the software allows pre-listening, I do not rely on it to DJ. I know my music. When I use pre-listening is to check details in the music.

My backup is a Windows machine with Foobar2000 installed. I also use an iPod Classic as a second backup, with several hundred tandas available.

I use a projector driven by custom-written software, that updates the track information automatically (title, orchestra, singer, year, and a photo of the orchestra director). The update has a five second delay, to allow the dancers to check the track information at the end of their dance. The information is displayed on a cream font against a black background. This is to reduce the brightness often associated with projectors.

My DJ motto

Observe, adjust, entertain!