How often have you taken a dance lesson where the instructor either has to tell someone to start/stop the music, or they had to run back and forth to press stop and play on the CD player? As a dance instructor, I need full control of my music while I keep my attendees engaged in the lesson. I hate inefficient use of time, and any time I have to run back and forth is just a poor use of time.

I always use technlogy to make things easier, and at JSmoothSalsa I've always made it a point to research technology to see if anthing can make our lessons the best possible. In this guide we will let you in on one of the most important aspects of our lessons: Music Control.

MP3 @ 192 kbps - The most obvious and first is that you need music if you are going to teach a dance class. You can either use actual CDs or you can use digital versions in the form of MP3s. Now before you start converting all your CDs to MP3 you gotta know something... not all MP3s are the same. Take for example iTunes.

At default, if you install iTunes and stick your first CD in to copy.... iTunes is defaulted to rip your music to the lowest possible size, which always results in lost in quality. You want to rip your music to something which retains the same quality as the CD.... because if you don't the song won't have the same oomph if you try playing it over to a big sound system. For us, all our songs are compressed at MP3 at 192 kps, the highest possible quality for an MP3. WinAmp 5.x - I don't like iTunes.... plain and simple. The reason why is because iTunes is marketed to people who really do nothing but press stop and play. With WinAmp and its library of plugins, I have the most control of my music on the fly. I can change the tempo or speed of the music, I can enhance the audio on the fly if it sounds a bit muffled, I can even have two of them opened up and play two different playlists in two different rooms!

PC Laptop - Strictly a preference, any laptop is fine as long as it has enough horse power where it won't skip a beat.

Logitech Wireless DJ - If you are going to be far away from your receiver, you'll need a wireless music player. Not all wireless transmitters are the same, as some of the cheaper ones are suseptible to interference. In addition, you want one that can do both RCA (red and white audio cables) and headphone cables. 

KeySpan Wireless Remote - Using Infra-red signals like your TV, we use this to control the music without having to run back and forth to the laptop. 

iPod Touch with AirMouse App - Used as a backup in case the wireless remote runs out of batteries, we can control the laptop all from the iPod. We connect the iPod to the laptop via a HOC connection (using the wireless card on the laptop to connect to the wireless feature on the ipod). Most people do not realize that you do not need to connect via a wireless network as how most of the software advertises you need to do.