#basic scratching course

Whats included in Basic Scratching?

Basic Scratching with DJ Rob Swift teaches the 9 cornerstone scratch techniques. Faderless scratches: baby, scribble, tear. Forward scratches: forward release, forward stab and forward drag. Intermediate scratches: reverse drag, transformer and chirp scratches. The fourth tutorial teaches how to combine all of the scratch techniques covered and how to phrase them. This will help you take your knowledge to the next level, creating scratch routines, improving social media content and more.

Each lecture has a accompanying Training Camp designed and hosted by DJ Rob Swift to help you practice your scratches and improve your confidence and fluidity.

Basic Scratching with DJ Rob Swift Breakdown

Faderless Scratches (Baby, Scribble and Tear)

Forward Scratches (Stab, Forward release, Forward Drag)

Intermediate Scratches (the Chirp, Transformer and Reverse Drag)

Combining the nine cornerstone scratches

Basic Scratching also includes Scratch Training Camps which match each lecture. These help you practice and are more focused on sharpening the techniques rather than learning the methods. These will help you hone in on your technique.

Review

Basic Scratching will teach you the cornerstone scratch techniques through information packed training to take you to the next level of your skills. This course is best suited for beginners and intermediate DJs who want to perfect the nine cornerstone scratching techniques.

Rob Swift’s hollistic approach to basic scratching will have you expressing your personal style through the cornerstone techniques. Focus is on finding your personal style and empowering DJs to be able scratch in a funky and exciting way.

Not sure if this course is for you?

Basic Scratching is for students who have some foundations in the techniques of DJing. The best way to learn the art of DJing is by building your skills one block at a time, taking the time to learn about each technique with intensity. Check out our other courses such as Basic DJing, for more foundational work such as hand alignment which will really help with the Basic Scratching course. If you’re looking for more advanced scratching work, check out Training Camp or Advanced Scratching. For Beat Juggling, check out the 10 Root Moves of Beat Juggling.

Whats included in Basic Scratching?

Basic Scratching with DJ Rob Swift teaches the 9 cornerstone scratch techniques. Faderless scratches: baby, scribble, tear. Forward scratches: forward release, forward stab and forward drag. Intermediate scratches: reverse drag, transformer and chirp scratches. The fourth tutorial teaches how to combine all of the scratch techniques covered and how to phrase them. This will help you take your knowledge to the next level, creating scratch routines, improving social media content and more.

Each lecture has a accompanying Training Camp designed and hosted by DJ Rob Swift to help you practice your scratches and improve your confidence and fluidity.

Basic Scratching with DJ Rob Swift Breakdown

Faderless Scratches (Baby, Scribble and Tear)

Forward Scratches (Stab, Forward release, Forward Drag)

Intermediate Scratches (the Chirp, Transformer and Reverse Drag)

Combining the nine cornerstone scratches

Basic Scratching also includes Scratch Training Camps which match each lecture. These help you practice and are more focused on sharpening the techniques rather than learning the methods. These will help you hone in on your technique.

Review

Basic Scratching will teach you the cornerstone scratch techniques through information packed training to take you to the next level of your skills. This course is best suited for beginners and intermediate DJs who want to perfect the nine cornerstone scratching techniques.

Rob Swift’s hollistic approach to basic scratching will have you expressing your personal style through the cornerstone techniques. Focus is on finding your personal style and empowering DJs to be able scratch in a funky and exciting way.

Not sure if this course is for you?

Basic Scratching is for students who have some foundations in the techniques of DJing. The best way to learn the art of DJing is by building your skills one block at a time, taking the time to learn about each technique with intensity. Check out our other courses such as Basic DJing, for more foundational work such as hand alignment which will really help with the Basic Scratching course. If you’re looking for more advanced scratching work, check out Training Camp or Advanced Scratching. For Beat Juggling, check out the 10 Root Moves of Beat Juggling.

At midnight tonight, the DJ community celebrates the 20th year anniversary of the documentary SCRATCH. Directed by Doug Pray and released by Palm Pictures on Feb.15, 2002, this powerful documentary continues to stand as a symbol for how a small group of marginalized DJs can effect change by banding together. Twenty years later the ripple effects of what DJs like the X-Ecutioners, Invisibl Skratch Piklz, Beat Junkies, still resonates.

Doug Pray does a thorough job of revealing how the authors (Kool Herc, Bambaataa, Grandmaster Flash, GrandWizzard Theodore, Grand Mixer D.St…) of DJing as we know it to be today, passed on techniques such as mixing, scratching and back spinning to the younger generation of DJs (Rob Swift, Roc Raida, Q-Bert, Mix Master Mike, Babu, Shortkut, DJ Shadow…). By building on the practices of their predecessors, these young visionaries furthered DJ culture and bum rushed a music industry that pushed them to the background during the 90s.

This may surprise you but although the years that roughly fall between 1993 and 1997 are considered Hip Hop’s golden era, DJs (with the exception of icons like Pete Rock and DJ Premier) were being replaced by INSTANT REPLAY machines. Hip Hop groups were foregoing the cost of taking an actual DJ on tour, pre-producing their stage shows and having the road manager press play on a machine that would run an hour set list nonstop. Many of you reading this might be too young to remember but as much dope Hip Hop was being released during those years, the mid 90s were dark times for DJs because they were undervalued by the music industry they were a part of and in lots of cases, their own rapper counterparts. But as every culture has it’s values, DJ culture brings with it traditions that DJs like the X-ecutioners, Piklz and Junkies refused to disregard.

So they rebelled against a system that didn’t see the value of paying a tour or studio DJ and started a musical revolution. They began organizing their own DJ tours, their own DJ battles and even recorded their own albums. Absent of the rappers and record label execs who felt they weren’t important. They pushed the true craft of DJing independently and penetrated an iron door of power by sneaking in through the back!

By 2001, the movie SCRATCH put a big fat exclamation point on an era of DJing that inspired DJ programs like Serato, along with the new state of the art mixers and controllers we see on the market now.

DJing today is a billion dollar industry. Practically every bar, nightclub, restaurant and department store (lol) has a DJ. You can go to sporting events and see/hear DJs spinning. DJ culture has become so popular that some people are willing to exploit it for Follows, “Likes”, Views and other forms of social media currency.

This learning pathway will help Advanced DJs navigate our courses and find the best learning pathway to suit their needs.

We consider advanced DJs to be those with solid foundational skills in mixing, set building, fundamental scratching.

Where to start?

We recommend browsing over the Basic Scratching course to ensure that you do cover the scratching bases in terms of skills, technique and undoing any bad habits that self-taught DJs may have encountered.

We assume that an advanced DJ is set on mixing by ear, dropping on beat, set arrangement and hand alignment and mechanics.

What course should I begin with?

10 Root Moves of Beat Juggling

This is our most popular course for intermediate and advanced DJs. This course takes you through all 10 of the root moves in details. This is the most comprehensive beat juggling guide out there.

Rob explains how to manipulate drum beats, words, etc. on both left and right turntables simultaneously through the application of the 10 Root Movements of “Beat Juggling”. This course is our most popular course. As a pioneer of beat juggling and creator of the ‘Swing Pattern’ there is no one better to teach these techniques.

Here is a details breakdown of the course content.

Backspinning and Backspinning with eighth and quarter note fills

the Breakdown Pattern

the Snare Pattern

the Offset Backspin

the Rock the Bells Pattern

the Swing Pattern

the Chase/Strobe Pattern

8th Note Linear Single Fills

8th Note Linear Double Fills

8th Note Linear Triple Fills

See the course here.

Advanced Beat Juggling

This advanced beat juggling course will help you take your skills to the next level. Now you have learned the root moves, you will learn to create your own patterns, how to combine all of the root moves to become a unique and more creative beat juggler. The emphasis in this course is creativity and self expression. Beat Juggling is not just being able to do somebody else’s pattern, but creating your own unique patterns and combinations too.

See the course here.

Training Camp with DJ Rob Swift

This mini course is designed for DJs who understand the 9 cornerstone scratches, have the correct alignment, technique etc. but want to perfect their skills. We have four training camp sessions:

Faderless Scratches (baby, tear, scribble)

Forward Scratches (forward stab, drag and release)

Intermediate Scratches (chirp, transformer, reverse drag)

Total Training (all 9 cornerstone scratches combined and phrasing)

This course will help you improve your skills and hone in on your scratch technique.