She Isn’t a DJ. That’s Exactly Why DJ.Studio Works.

Being a DJ in 2026 is not only about the two hours you play. It is the Reel you post on Tuesday, the radio show due on Thursday, the mashup you test before Saturday, and the practice you squeeze in between all of it. For a lot of women in our community there is another layer: not everyone has decks at home, or a safe space to practice until they feel ready.

That is the conversation I wanted to have with Fleur. What I didn’t expect was how honest she would be about her own starting point. “I wasn’t a DJ at all,” she told me, laughing. “I am not a DJ.” And somehow, that is the best argument for the software she helps build.

Who is Fleur van der Laan

Fleur is COO at DJ.Studio, the company behind the software of the same name, based in Leeuwarden in the north of the Netherlands. Before DJ.Studio, she and most of the team spent more than a decade building software together at AppMachine, a Dutch app building company. Music arrived later, almost by accident.

“We made software before, and then we by accident started making software for DJs,” she says. “So I learned a lot about music and DJing along the way.” Today she can talk you through an echo versus a reverb, a bass swap versus a crossfade, and exactly which features working DJs fight for.

She is also one of two women on a team in a field that is still heavily male. Her colleague Lizie runs support and much of the testing. “It works really well with the guys,” Fleur says, but she is glad not to be the only woman in the room.

Her real skill is translation. The team includes DJs who look after quality and tell the developers what matters on a real dancefloor, and Fleur sits in the middle. “I don’t have the touch and feel of a DJ,” she says, “but I know exactly how the tool is supposed to work, what features are important and what DJs like.”

A lost hobby, a laptop and Armin van Buuren

DJ.Studio started with a very human problem. Siebrand Dijkstra, the company’s founder and CEO, spent his evenings building DJ mixes on his computer with MixMeister, the classic timeline mixing tool, and sharing them with friends. Then he bought a new M1 Mac, and MixMeister stopped working on it.

“He lost his hobby,” Fleur says. “He was desperate, because he spent so many evenings making DJ mixes.” Siebrand had a software company and a team of developers, so he made a decision most of us can only dream of: build his own tool. One of the developers was deep into audio and synthesizers, and the team asked him a simple question. Could he make a DJ mixing tool on a timeline?

A few months later the team presented an early version at Amsterdam Dance Event. People liked it, among them Phil Morse of Digital DJ Tips, and the whole company slowly moved onto the new app. The first DJ.Studio get together at ADE was small, around twenty people. Fleur still remembers how unusual it felt to meet users face to face. “When you have software that’s being used worldwide, you hardly see people,” she says. “You communicate by email or through the support desk.”

Two years later, the team was talking with Armada Music. Armin van Buuren gives a workshop with Armada University every year, and the label asked whether it could be about DJ.Studio. At ADE 2024, Armin hosted a hands on masterclass called Armin van Buuren x DJ.Studio, showing how he prepares his sets inside the software. The same season, Armada University and DJ.Studio ran a mashup contest for DJs and producers.

“I still get the chills,” Fleur says. “With Armin, I think we already hit the highest note.”

“I love the fact that even if I’m not a DJ, I can create something that sounds great, because the tool helps me so much.”

Fleur van der Laan, COO, DJ.Studio

What DJ.Studio actually is

Think of DJ.Studio as a studio for DJs rather than a live performance tool. Instead of two decks and a jog wheel, you get a visual timeline on your laptop, Windows or Mac, where every track, transition and effect sits in front of you. Nothing is “live”, so you can try something, listen, undo it and try again.

It works in two modes, which Fleur showed me on screen:

• DJ Mix mode. You build a full set, ten or thirty tracks, an hour of music. DJ.Studio places one track after another and creates a transition window, the moment where both tracks play together.
• Mashup mode. You choose two or three tracks and combine them freely, for example the vocal of one on top of the instrumental of another.

When you add tracks, the software analyses them for you: beatgrid, key, BPM, waveforms and where the vocals are. It beat matches automatically and connects to the libraries DJs already use, including rekordbox, Serato, Apple Music, YouTube and Beatport, according to the company.

Step by step 1: learn to mix with no controller at home

So many women hold back because they don’t have their own equipment, or a safe space to practice. So I asked Fleur directly: can someone build a real skill without a controller at home?

“Yeah, you can,” she answered straight away. “If you have a laptop, you only invest in your DJ.Studio license.” Because everything is visual, you can see what a transition does to the music, not only hear it. Here is how to practice the way she described.

1. Start a DJ Mix project and add a handful of tracks you know well. Let DJ.Studio analyse them; it finds the beatgrid, key and tempo for you.
2. Open a transition window, the zone where the outgoing and incoming tracks overlap. DJ.Studio applies a default transition so you have a starting point.
3. Watch the volume lines. In a volume crossfade you see two white lines, one track rising while the other falls. That is the move your hands would make on a mixer.
4. Swap the transition type and listen again. Fleur’s advice: “If you don’t like it, you just hit the button and say okay, let’s not try the volume fade, let’s try a bass swap. Try a low to high pass filter, and see if that sounds right.”
5. Move the mix point. Drag the incoming track to a different spot, for example from an intro to a break, and listen to how it changes the energy.
6. Repeat until your ears lead. The goal is not to let the software decide. It is to learn what works and why, so the same instincts are there when you finally stand behind real decks.

“It’s really easy just to change it and listen,” Fleur says. “That’s just good for practicing your skills, or finding the best mixing point.”

Step by step 2: turn your mix into Reels

Today a DJ has to post all the time, or be connected to radio and streaming. That was the next thing I asked Fleur about, and it is where DJ.Studio surprised me most.

“Even if you have a big mashup or a big mix, you can just select a really short piece,” she says. “Because on Instagram, it’s all about short content. You select the parts that you’re really proud of, the parts that make you think: that sounds awesome.”

1. Finish your mix or mashup as usual, then play it back and note the 15 to 60 seconds that hit hardest.
2. Select that part on the timeline. DJ.Studio exports only the selection, and the export window confirms it with the exact start and end time.
3. Choose your format. Pick Audio (MP3 on every plan, WAV and FLAC on the higher ones) if you want a clean sound file to put under a Reel you film yourself. Pick Video if you want DJ.Studio to make the visual for you.
4. Set it to portrait. In the Video tab you can switch to the vertical format used by Reels, TikTok and Stories.
5. Style the visuals. The Video tab offers a spectrum analyser, album art, images or colour backgrounds, plus options like particles, wave lines and track information on screen.
6. Export and post. “You get the visuals and the audio that you created,” Fleur says, “and it’s ready to post.”

A practical note: video export is part of DJ.Studio’s top Ultimate plan, while audio export is available on every plan. If you are starting out, exporting the audio and filming your own clip on top works perfectly well.

Step by step 3: build a radio show to the exact minute

Fleur is clear that DJ.Studio is not trying to replace playing live. “DJing is something that you do live, and that’s an art,” she says. “But if you need to create a radio show, why do you need to record it live on the decks? If you’re travelling, if you’re somewhere else and you’re not with your decks, you can do the stuff that you need to do.”

Radio has one rule that live sets don’t: the slot is fixed. As I told Fleur, it is usually exactly one hour. This is how to hit it.

1. Start a DJ Mix and add your tracks from your library. DJ.Studio analyses each one and shows its key and tempo.
2. Press Harmonize. It uses the Camelot wheel to suggest the best order, by key, by BPM or both. You can also tell it what kind of set it is: for a late set you might want the BPM to come down, for example.
3. Shape every transition. Zoom into a transition and choose how it sounds: a volume swap, a fade out, a bass swap, an effect like a swoosh, or stems, such as an a cappella over an instrumental.
4. Lock what you love. When a transition sounds right, hit the lock button so nothing gets squeezed in between, then jump to the next transition.
5. Cut it to time. If the show runs long, click one of the song’s phrases (the coloured intro, verse and chorus blocks) and press delete. The track gets shorter without breaking the mix.
6. Watch the counter. The timer in the top left corner shows the total length, so you can trim until you land on exactly one hour.
7. Export and deliver the finished file to the station or your streaming platform.

The same trick works for live sets. Fleur’s tip: build your set in DJ.Studio, export it, “and go running for an hour” while you listen back. If something feels off, change it at home before you play it for real.

Step by step 4: mashups and stems

This is the part of the interview where Fleur lit up. “A mashup makes your performance more special,” she says, “because people at first think they know the track, and suddenly it sounds different. They’re like: what’s this? What’s this? It’s your own creation.”

You build it in DJ.Studio, export it as an MP3, and play it in your live set like any other track.

1. Create a new project and choose Mashup, the open music canvas where tracks can sit anywhere, on top of each other.
2. Add two or three tracks. DJ.Studio shows each track’s key and suggests combinations that are likely to sound good together.
3. Check the keys. Tracks in the same key, or next to each other on the Camelot wheel, blend best. If two are far apart, click a clip and transpose it. Fleur’s warning: don’t push it too far, “because then people won’t recognise it.”
4. Turn on stems. One button inside the app separates each track into drums, bass, melody and vocals. It takes a few minutes per track.
5. Lift the vocal. Select the piece you want and copy the vocals to a sample lane, then drag them over your other track. DJ.Studio automatically fits the vocal to the tempo of the track underneath.
6. Press mute stem. This silences the original vocal in the main track, so you never have two singers clashing. “With one press of a button, you can make sure that they’re not singing at the same time,” Fleur says.
7. Line it up with the phrases. The coloured phrase blocks show intros, verses and choruses, and blue lines mark where people are singing. Start your vocal on a phrase so it lands naturally.
8. Export as MP3 and drop it into your set.

One detail I noticed during the demo: when Fleur changed the key of the vocal, the voice still sounded natural. “Our audio engineers spent a lot of time to make sure that it still sounds the same, even if you transpose or let somebody sing faster,” she explains. If you have ever heard a chipmunk vocal in a mix, you know why that matters.

Harmonic mixing you can see, and help when you get stuck

Key clashes are one of the fastest ways to lose a room, and DJ.Studio makes them visible. Every track gets a Camelot code, like 8A or 11B, and the tracklist marks how well each pair matches.

• Same code, for example 8A to 8A: a perfect match.
• One or two steps around the wheel, for example 9A to 11A: works well.
• Big jumps, for example 8A down to 5A: DJ.Studio flags them in red. You can still do it for a short moment, but not for long.

Fleur put it in dancefloor terms: drop three steps down the wheel and “people will feel sad, and they will leave the dance floor, and it will be a shame.” If a list has too many red marks, the Harmonize wizard reorders it for you. And if you want something groovier than a perfectly safe line of matching keys, you can always drag tracks into your own order.

If the interface feels like a lot at first, you are not alone. I told Fleur that the first time I opened DJ.Studio, I couldn’t work it out by myself. Her answer: click the chat bubble in the app. It opens DJ.Studio’s AI assistant, and you can ask it things like how to add an echo effect. “It needs a little bit of time,” she says, “but then it shows you, often including screenshots, and tells you where to go in the application.” Fleur and Liz also answer questions there themselves.

Two things are coming. The developers are working on letting you ask the AI for help with the mix itself, for example which five tracks would fit a list of ten. And the team is preparing Coach Connect, where experienced users can apply to become certified DJ.Studio coaches. They will be interviewed and send in a mix and a mashup, and you will be able to book one directly, at their own rate. It had not launched at the time of our interview.

Your first gig, and why prepping at home counts

Before we finished, I asked Fleur what she would tell someone who has never played out but just landed their first gig.

“If it’s your first gig, I would go for safe,” she says. Build a list of tracks that sound good together, in the same key or close to it, at a similar tempo, “because that helps you to make great transitions.” The stress, the people and the lights will give you more than enough energy and nerves already. Then practice, practice, practice. And have a plan you trust. “If someone asks, can you play this song? At my first gig, I would say: maybe later. Let me stick to the plan.”

Then we talked about something I hear a lot in our community: the idea that preparing a set on a laptop is somehow cheating. I don’t believe it. Sometimes you are touring, sometimes you don’t have a controller with you, and that doesn’t make you less of a DJ. Fleur agrees. “It’s just an additional tool,” she says. Prepare at home, test at home, and don’t test on your audience. If something feels strange, you change it before the gig. “Nobody will know.”

One last, lighter question: what is her favourite track to test a transition? Techno is the easy answer, she says, because there is no singing to clash. But her heart is with ABBA’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!” and the remixes of it. “I always like something old in a new jacket,” she says, “because then I just recognise it.” Which, if you think about it, is exactly what a good mashup does.

Try it yourself

DJ.Studio has a 7 day free trial with no payment details needed, so you can test everything in this article on your own tracks first. If you decide to buy, DJaneMag UAE readers get a discount through our link: tolt.link/djanemag.

Which plan you need depends on what you want to do. Based on DJ.Studio’s own pricing page:

Licenses are one time purchases with 12 months of updates and support, and DJ.Studio offers a 14 day money back guarantee on them.

Whether you are practicing in your bedroom in Dubai, building a radio show between tour dates, or cooking up the mashup that makes your crowd ask “what’s this?”, the message from Fleur is the same: you don’t need to wait for the perfect setup to start. You need a laptop, your music and the patience to listen.

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