All In! All Done! - Sold!

Morgan Park Academy threw a fundraiser at Adler Planetarium. It consisted of a silent auction and a live auction to raise money for their school. They flew in an auctioneer from Washington to handle the emcee work and auctioneering. The dj booth was set up in the Galileo room with 6 speakers spaced out from there down past the sun. If you haven’t been to the Adler, you have no idea what I’m talking about. James leaded this gig with a broken hand. Chris, Tim, David, and myself set the space up. It was a huge set up with cables and speakers running rampant. A little exaggeration. It was a well thought out plan that was executed with extreme precision. I think we’re getting much better at these big set ups, both in placement of the equipment and in execution of the set up. It was like clockwork. James pointed, we moved. He was the brains, we were the brawn. Tim and David took off after set up and Chris stayed to assist me with the deejaying while James kept an ear on the big picture as the producer of the event. Music during the evening started off with some tunes from the Hidden Beach collection, moved into classic jazz standards, and then I hit some of what I’m know for – worldly down-tempo electronic lounge along with some lightly sprinkled deep house tracks. I love this stuff. I had just gotten some new stuff off emusic.com and I had been waiting to play it. Finally got the chance. I love this stuff. We also did music cues for the live auction. When an item sold for high amount or if it was an intense bidding, we would play 10-15 seconds of a song. My favorites were “Oh Yeah” by Yello and “Start Me Up” by the Rolling Stones. We also played the Bull’s theme song when tickets to one of their games came up, and “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey when White Sox tickets were auctioned. James made sure that the space sounded great by monitoring the speakers and adjusting as conditions in the room changed. He also tended to the Auctioneer so he could sell the items. Chris was tending to me and also keeping an eye on the big picture as well. We worked well as a team and made sure the evening was a success.