Serato Workshop
Photo Credit: Marat Berenstein
Product specialists Matthew “Recloose” Chicoine and OP Miller presented an exclusive workshop and gave students an early look at the new Roland X Serato flagship controller DJ808, a versatile new instrument that breaks down conventional barriers between DJing, performance, and production.
About OP!
OP! is the founder of The Definitive Sound, a music specialty company. OP! is a talented DJ and tastemaker that has over 20 years of experience as a DJ. Since the age of 14, he has perfected the skill of playing music for crowds from New York to Johannesburg and many points between. As a multi-genre DJ with an eclectic taste in music, OP!'s sound ranges from hip-hop, r&b, reggae, pop, rock, and classics to house, future soul, and various electronic genres from around the world.
OP! is a partner and lead DJ at the New York City monthly parties I Love Vinyl and Afrokinetic. As well, OP! holds residences at award winning speakeasy Bathtub Gin in Manhattan and the uber hip Royal Palm Shuffle Club in Brooklyn. In addition, he has opened for Q-Tip (A Tribe Called Quest), Quest Love (The Roots/Jimmy Fallon), Afrika Bambaataa (godfather of Hip-Hop), Shuggie Otis (70's legend) and Sec. Of State Hillary Clinton. Whether playing for 500 plus people at NYC hotspots or DJing for thousands of people at Prospect Park (The Pop Up Dinner) or Central Park (Summerstage), OP! has the taste and skill to get any dance floor and audience moving in a frenzy.
About Recloose
It all started in the spring of 1997 when Detroit native Matthew Chicoine, aka Recloose, made contact with techno pioneer Carl Craig by way of a legendary ‘demo-on-rye sandwich’. This fateful meeting led to the signing of Recloose to Craig's seminal Planet E label and the birth of an eclectic and vibrant musical career.
Recloose's musical roots trace back to years music study and playing jazz saxophone, later shifting focus to the art of collecting and mixing vinyl while at the University of Michigan. His eclectic DJ sets, first heard on Ann Arbor’s WCBN, led him to become an in-demand DJ, regularly playing at clubs and festivals in the EU/UK, USA, Japan, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Brazil, Australia and New Zealand.
Over his twenty-year career Recloose has developed into a standout of Detroit’s musical litter, releasing a number of groundbreaking 12”s for Planet E, Rush Hour, Delusions of Grandeur; remixes for the likes of Funkadelic, Herbert, Motor City Drum Ensemble, Tei Towa, Dennis Coffey, MJ Cole and Azymuth; a live album; and four full-length LPs debuting with ‘Cardiology’‚ on Planet E / !K7 in 2002.
In 2001 Recloose relocated to New Zealand to explore new musical horizons, releasing two LPs for Peacefrog and Sonar Kollektiv, assembling a live band that would tour the world, and dropping his largest tunes to date including the dancefloor stomper ‘Dust’ featuring Fat Freddy’s vocalist Joe Dukie. He went on to launch the Hit It & Quit It radio show with partner Frank Booker in 2009 (recently revived on NYC’s East Village Radio), and take up residence at Auckland’s Music and Audio Institute of New Zealand to set up and deliver a full-time DJ and Electronic Music Production (DJEMP) program.
In 2014 Recloose’s career entered a new phase, with him re-locating to Brooklyn, NY to re-invigorate his music making and take up work for DJ technology company Serato helping to run their artist relations program at their new Studio 2 facility in Greenpoint. He has a new EP slated for release on Aus Music in June 2016.