Here’s some questions I asked them at our interview:

1. What kind of mixer do you use? What kind of software?
2. Do you smoke?
3. Do you have reliable transportation?
4. How long have you been DJing?
5. Where in the area have you DJ’d previously?
6. Have you DJ’d a wedding before? If so, have you DJ’d a ceremony?
7. Do you own your own speakers? What about your own lights?
8. Do you have a wireless microphone?
9. If you rent, where do you rent from?
10. What would you wear to a wedding if hired to DJ for it?

Then, I asked the situational questions. Situational interview questions are a great way to test for attitude and reliability before hiring a potential DJ. Here are 5 examples:

1) Say you were at a wedding and everyone was dancing and having a great time, but the bride told you to play HER music and change the song. Let’s also say that you knew the bride’s selection could kill the dance floor. Would you change the music for the bride, or play for the guests?

2) You are on your way to a wedding and are 2 hours early. You stop at the gas station to fill up. As you step out of the car, you break your leg somehow. There is no way you can play the wedding. The gas station attendant calls an ambulance. You have no idea what to do. Do you:

A) Call the bride and groom
B) Call the venue
C) Call Airwaves
D) Call an emergency DJ in your phone
E) See what happens and call later if needed

3) You are at a wedding and the guests are dancing. The venue manager tells you to turn the music down and end the party. Curfew is 12pm and it’s 12:05. The guests, bride and groom complain and want to keep dancing. Do you keep playing or shut down the party?

4) You are playing a slideshow for the bride and groom when suddenly, the grooms father walks up to you and requests you play a secret DVD for him that he has prepared. You just found out about the DVD now and playing it will throw off the wedding timeline. Do you play the DVD or not?

5) Your speaker stops working mid dance. Do you call a friend to bring a new speaker, or do you continue with the dance and make do?

Then, we ask some straightforward questions. Here are 10 examples.

1. Have you ever missed a wedding?
2. Have you ever missed an event?
3. Tell me about a time you dealt with a difficult customer
4. Tell me about a time you had a verbal confrontation and why
5. What makes you the most frustrated in life?
6. What’s your biggest pet peeve when DJing?
7. Tell me about a situation where you would get so angry you would pack up and leave an event.
8. Is it okay to cancel a wedding with 2 weeks notice? Why or why not?
9. Is it okay to bill a bride after the event for overtime?
10. Are contracts important in business? If so, why?

Then, last but not least, we look for indicators that the DJ has actually performed some events. Here are the top 5 indicators:

1. Provide us with a photo of you DJing at an event
2. Provide us with a soundcloud mix
3. Provide us with your top 20 favorite songs to play at a wedding
4. How would you prepare for a wedding if you were unfamiliar with the music genre?
5. We call their references. At least 3, usually 5 or more.

From there, they begin our 15 step process, where we actually test them in the field.

So you can see, it isn’t easy to find a good wedding DJ, and at our company, we take our time to get to know someone well before we send them to your event. Even with all of this, we have to continually meet with our DJs on a monthly basis in person to ensure they are still passionate about delivering amazing musical entertainment services at their upcoming events. In this business, things can change very quickly and a DJ who was once eager and excited can lose interest over the course of a few weeks. If we sense this is happening, then we will send someone else to your event. We have to feel the DJ is excited to be there.

From there, we let you decide. We introduce you to your DJ and let you interview them after this entire process has taken place.

So if you have time to do all of this, then by all means, we hope this guide serves you well. For everyone else, it might just be worth having a company like Airwaves Music to do this all for you. After all, a lot goes into finding great talent and we do this full-time, 7 days a week, 400+ events per year!