One eight hundred two two three ninety seven ninety seven.

Late night Mr. C to finish a big door pit bulls.

DJs are the backbone of hip hop.

They start parties and keep them going.

Without DJs there would be no breaks for dancers to groove to

and no beats for emcees to rhyme over.

In fact, the moment we recognize as the birth of hip-hop was a back-to-school

party organized by Cindy Campbell and DJed by her uncle, Clive Campbell, aka DJ Cool Herk.

DJs introduce us to songs, to artists. The fans may decide what stays in rotation, but it was a DJ who first spun that record,

catching the ears of those

fans who demand to hear it again and again. From block parties to clubs to radio, the DJ is the

plug for what's hot, and Brooklyn's own Mr. C not only kept hip-hop's premiere station buzzing for decades,

he also introduced us to one of rap's most iconic and game-changing rappers. Mr. C. was born

Calvin LeBron to a southern mother and a West Indian father from Trinidad. His dad ran numbers and his

mother was a hustler. As a kid, he spent weekends walking up and down Fulton Street going in and

out of stores with his dad. C never learned the numbers game, but his dad did teach him to embrace his West Indian side

and to always be proud of where he came from and who he was.

Growing up in the Lafayette Gardens projects, C was destined to become a DJ from the age of three

when he was already messing around with a record player,

pulling the needle back and forth on 45s, scratching.

His father introduced him to music, mostly Bob Marley, but when he was five and a half, he started living with his grandparents,

and it was his Uncle Barry who sowed the seeds of Mr. C's hip-hop future.

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