How do DJs prepare their sets

A pre-gig checklist: the slot, a readable library, BPM and key, a shortlist, cues, a listen-through, the USB and a spare, and the morning of the gig.

A prepared set is a short list you can still change on the night. You know the slot, the files have names, the tempos and keys have been read, the cues you need are marked, you have heard the blends, and the stick in your bag is one you already played.

The order of the keys, and the shape of the hour, are separate notes. How to plan a DJ set is the harmonic order, the tempo, and the listen. How to structure a DJ set is warm-up, peak, and close. This page is the checklist around them.

Sonata can take the listen-through. You pick the tracks. It reads the key and the tempo, suggests an order, flags the pairs that clash, and plays the set. You can throw the suggestion out. You still do the djing.

Write down the slot

Three lines, before you pull a crate:

  • How long you are playing.
  • Where the set sits: opening, middle, or peak.
  • What you play from: a USB in a player, a laptop, or both.

If you do not have the length or the place in the night, ask. An opening hour and a peak hour are different sets. The shape for the slot is in the structure guide. The key order and the tempo walk are in the planning guide.

Pull more tracks than the slot, from files you have the right to play. You are going to cut. Leave that cutting until the names, the tempos, and the keys are filled in.

Hear your set before the gig →

Make the library readable

The name on the player is the name in the file.

rekordbox shows the title and the artist. Fill both in before you export. If a file has moved, rekordbox can mark it missing, and a missing file may not export. Relocate is covered in Rekordbox USB export not working.

Serato DJ Pro does not copy music into the app. It points at the file where it already lives. Move that file, or unplug the drive, and the track shows as missing. The Prepare panel is a holding area, like records lifted in a bag. It empties when you quit, and a track also leaves Prepare once it has been played. To keep the list, select it and drag it onto Make New Crate.

Traktor stores the title, artist, tempo, genre, and key in the Track Collection, along with its own markers. If you move the audio, right-click the track and choose Relocate. Right-click Track Collection and choose Save Collection when you want the edits written before you close the program. Closing saves the collection too.

In Sonata, a title is missing from the tracklist when the tags are empty. One playlist, crate, or folder for this gig is enough.

Check the tempo and the key

Do this before you settle the order.

In rekordbox, analysis can start when a file is added to the collection. If new files have no BPM or key, open Preferences, Analysis, Track Analysis, Track Analysis Setting, include BPM / Grid and KEY, then choose Analyze Track from the Track menu or by right-clicking the track. The key can show as a note name, or as a code such as 1A: Preferences, View, Display Type, Key display format, Classic or Alphanumeric.

In Traktor, right-click the tracks and choose Analyze (Async). Include BPM and Key. BPM has a tempo range, and the manual says a narrower range is more accurate when the tracks sit together. Do it before you are in front of a room. Locked tracks keep their BPM, grid, and key unless you choose to replace locked values.

In Serato, a library BPM at about half or about double the tempo you count is a scale error. Set the range and re-analyze before you trust a climb. The steps are in Why is my Serato BPM wrong.

Sonata measures tempo from the audio. A BPM already in the file only helps it choose between that reading and half or double of it. It does not write a BPM back to the file. It suggests an order. It does not decide the set. For one file, the BPM and key finder reads the tempo in the browser. Your tracks stay on this device.

Keys in Sonata are Camelot codes. The wheel maps all 24, and the key checker answers a pair. Same code, one step, or the relative major or minor is In key. Anything else is a key clash, including the move DJs call an energy boost. That move is in Harmonic mixing energy boosts. When you mean to leave the wheel, Is harmonic mixing necessary? is the note. Hear the pair either way.

Cut a shortlist down to the slot

Build the list longer than the set, in the order you mean to play, then remove tracks until it fits the time you wrote down.

Put it in a rekordbox playlist, a Serato crate, or a Traktor playlist: the list you will browse on the night. Know the last track before you head to the gig. If the night runs long, cut from the middle of the plan, not from the ending you already trusted. Where the peak sits is the structure guide.

Plan your set order in Sonata →

Mark the cues you will use

A mix-in and a mix-out are enough for a lot of blends. Mark those, and any other point you know you will jump to.

rekordbox stores them as memory cues or hot cues. Hot cues can be called on a DJ player. The rekordbox 7.1 manual says the number of hot cues depends on the player, so the player's manual is the count. A USB export puts the playlist and the cue information in the library on the stick. rekordbox's USB export page describes OneLibrary as the format that holds playlists, cue points, and beatgrids. Device Library is the older library. Which player reads which one is in Rekordbox USB export not working.

Serato DJ Pro has up to 8 cue points. They are saved to the file, and they stay if the file is moved or renamed.

Traktor keeps its markers in the Track Collection. Export or back up that collection when you want them on another machine. Copying the audio is not the collection backup the manual describes.

Sonata's rekordbox playlist is the order only. It does not carry cues. The XML file does: a mix-in and a mix-out. USB tracks, on Pro and marked beta, writes each file with those two cues into a legacy Pioneer library, not OneLibrary. It writes the top of an empty stick, or a stick that holds only Sonata's own mix folders. A stick that already has a library is refused, and nothing already on the stick is deleted. The mix file is one WAV or MP3 plus a tracklist, with no cues and no beatgrid. Free is one mix of up to 10 tracks, with WAV while the set stays inside that cap. MP3, the rekordbox playlist, the XML, and USB tracks are part of Pro.

Hear the transitions

Reading a key pair is not the same as hearing it. Play the set once, at a volume where a clash is obvious, including every pair you flagged and every blend you have not stood in front of.

The blend length, the tempo gap that becomes an echo or a fade, and what each export file contains are in the planning guide. If the suggestion fights the slot, reorder it. The tool does not know the room.

Export the stick, and keep a spare

The library export carries the playlist, the cues, and the grids. Copying the audio across by itself leaves those behind.

For a player that reads a rekordbox library, export from a current rekordbox 7. AlphaTheta's notice of 18 March 2026 says version 7.2.11 or later writes both OneLibrary and Device Library on export, and that a library already on the stick may still need a manual convert. If the player shows nothing, follow Rekordbox USB export not working, then CDJ will not read your USB. The file system is the other half of that fault. Which players rekordbox lists for exFAT is in FAT32 and exFAT. Play the stick on the gear you will use if you can.

Take a second stick with the same export. rekordbox can also back up the collection from the File menu, Library, Backup Library, and it asks whether to include the music files. The separate Device library backup needs the Professional plan and Cloud Library Sync. It does not copy the audio, and it keeps only the latest export for each stick. The spare stick is the copy you can plug in.

Traktor's collection export is a backup of Traktor. Right-click Track Collection, choose Export the Collection, and leave the $ at the start of the title. Traktor also writes a collection backup when you close it after a change. AlphaTheta's October 2025 announcement scheduled OneLibrary USB export for Traktor Play and Traktor Pro 4 in later updates. The OneLibrary page still listed Native Instruments as coming when this page was checked. Check Native Instruments for the version you have before you rely on a Traktor stick at a player. Export the rekordbox library as well when the booth reads that.

If you are playing Serato from a laptop, test that laptop: the crate, the cues, and the drive Serato is reading.

Pack for the booth you were told about

Ask what is in the booth, and what you need to plug in. Pack that.

  • Headphones.
  • The laptop and its charger, when the set runs from the laptop.
  • The stick you already played, and the spare, when the set runs from USB.
  • The original tracks. The export is a convenience, not the only copy.

If nobody named a cable, ask before you pack one.

The morning of the gig

Leave with the stick you already heard, not a fresh export from the same morning.

  • Power for the laptop, or a yes from the booth that power is there.
  • Time to load one track and one blend, if they give you the decks.
  • If the player does not see the stick, start with CDJ will not read your USB. The order of the songs is not the fault.

If the room wants a different third track, play the different third track. The checklist is there so the change is a choice.

Hear your whole set before the gig. The first mix is free, up to 10 tracks, and it does not ask for an account.

Sources

Sonata is not affiliated with rekordbox, Pioneer DJ, AlphaTheta, Serato, or Native Instruments.

Related guides

Hear your whole set before the gig.

Your first mix is free, up to 10 tracks. Sonata checks the keys, flags the clashes and plays the set.

Hear your set