Before DJing at an event or venue, one of Curtis Dorgan’s favorite question is asking the host ten songs they want to hear and ten they don’t. These simple questions allow Dorgan to get a feel for the crowd and determine how to bring more shoes to the dance floor.
“It’s all about the audience, and I think that’s where I try to focus on making myself successful is reading the audience and feeling what they’re wanting,” Dorgan said.
Dorgan, owner and DJ of the party entertainment service known as “All Out Productions LLC,” runs his own business centered on coordinating with local event planners and bringing people together through music.
Dorgan worked as an event promoter in other cities before moving back to Muncie and eventually found interest in creating his business after trying to start his own nightclub.
“I got a little disillusioned with working in the real world, and I wanted to open up a nightclub space downtown,” Dorgan said. “And when I got frustrated with not being able to get a space and find an available space, I said, ‘You know, I'm just going to have to get the equipment, and I'm going to start doing my own events and DJ.’”
From playing music at family gatherings to building his own record collection, Dorgan spent his entire life surrounded by music. He said his mom is a big music person and listened to multiple genres, which helped him become an avid music lover.
“She was never a person to tell me no about listening to different types of music,” Dorgan said. “She would also let me explore myself and try to find things that I liked.”
Dorgan graduated from Ball State University with a degree in audio/video production. He said music can enhance community and further develop relationships with other people.
“I think the more you can embrace music and bring music as part of your culture, it makes everybody a little bit easier to get along with because you can understand people a lot by their music taste sometimes,” Dorgan said.
Music helps Dorgan connect and grow closer to various people including his own husband, Ramiro Hernandez. Dorgan said Hernandez’s music taste helps him communicate his thoughts and emotions.
“I'm married to a metalhead and [he] actually is one of the calmest, nicest, polite, kind [people]. But that music is that voice that he doesn't feel he has sometimes to express, and it's kind of an outlet to those feelings that he doesn't always feel he can speak himself,” Dorgan said. “So music can sometimes be just your way of reaching to make that expression that you don't feel comfortable making yourself.”
Hernandez met Dorgan in Chicago, and one thing Hernandez always appreciated was Dorgan’s wide variety of music tastes, including music of Hernandez’s own culture.
“He also got into Spanish music and music of all cultures, and that's what drew me to him, as well as just surprised that I can meet someone that wasn't Hispanic listen to a lot of Hispanic music,” Hernandez said.
Hernandez helps Dorgan run All Out Productions mainly through what Hernandez claims as behind-the-curtain activities like loading sound equipment and also utilizing his baking business to cater food for events Dorgan DJs at.
Hernandez said Dorgan is willing to bring multiple different genres of music to events in Muncie that other DJs would likely not play. This aspect of Dorgan’s DJing doesn’t go unnoticed by the crowds he plays to.
“One of the biggest things that we get when we're out is that — especially with like him, not being scared to do Latin music or alternative rock music — is that our crowds do tell us that they're thankful for him bringing that type of music to Muncie and doing events that do that type of music as well,” Hernandez said.
Regarding Dorgan’s awareness of crowds, Hernandez said he can read the room and see the response to the songs he plays, and he’ll change songs or genres to cater to everyone.
“Let's just say that if somebody wasn't really feeling it — and he can see it — and he'll find a way to switch up the genre or something, switch up the decade, even to until he can get them going, get them dancing,” Hernandez said.
Cheryl Crowder, the event director for Muncie Downtown Development Partnership, worked with All Out Productions throughout various events in Muncie such as Fire Up DWNTWN and the Magic City Brewfest.
“He kept the party going; he knew the right music to play and when to play it. He's just always done a really, really good job for us,” Crowder said.
While Dorgan mainly works in the Muncie region at corporate parties, nightclubs, weddings and class reunions, he prefers events with high energy and flexibility in music preferences to showcase a more diverse music playlist. Dorgan said music has the power to uplift people regardless of the difficulties in life they’re facing.
“Music that makes people get up and enjoy life and forget about their problems for just a little bit of time, or maybe help re-energize them so they can get up the next day and feel a little happier about what's going on in the world [is important]. There's so much negative out there why not have a little positive,” Dorgan said.
Dorgan also witnessed multiple songs bring entire communities together based on factors like major events occurring in the United States. He cites Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” as an example of a track that has the power to unite many walks of life with different views under a singular purpose.
“There are times in our history where we have faced obstacles together, collectively, and simple songs like ‘Born This Way,’ At first, it was like, ‘OK, it's kind of good,’ then all of a sudden, you started seeing that people felt that it meant something. It was really standing for who we really are,” Dorgan said.
Ultimately, when it comes to DJing, Dorgan said there’s no such thing as a good DJ or a bad one, but only DJs who “don’t pay attention” to their crowds and play only the songs they have set up. For Dorgan, he tells event hosts the songs he’ll start with and gauges their preferences based on their body language and reactions.
“Even though I think I'm pretty good about selecting music for an event, it's not my event … I want to make sure that I'm listening to them and not just to what I think is going to be the best,” Dorgan said.
Contact Zach Gonzalez via email at zachary.gonzalez@bsu.edu.
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