- "DC Street Jocks Rocked The House" is presented by the African American Music Association in partnership with WHUT Howard University Television.

Funding is provided by the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities with additional support provided by Takoma Station Tavern.

(record needle scratching) ♪ Everybody get up on and dance ♪ ♪ Get on up yeah ♪ - It began in DC's house parties and cabarets.

- I was the music guy so I would play the records at the party.

- A music evolution that would change the game.

- Eardrum's record pool was reporting to Billboard.

That had never ever, ever happened nor I think was a thought in the past.

- A small army of music lovers who were paid to play.

- The best jocks in DC were these street jocks.

There was nobody better than them.

- They innovated and manipulated new sounds with records, turntables and mixing.

- It's an art and a craft.

- They created a mood, energy and magic.

- DJs weren't just playing the music.

They were also in control of the music.

- They became legends of Black DC's nightlife.

Music mixers, music marvels who shaped the sound of music from the streets, to the clubs, from radio air play, to top 100 hits.

They were magicians of music.

DC's street jocks.

♪ Everybody well turn up the sound ♪ - This is the story of DC's Street Jocks a group of gifted, music loving, creative geniuses of sound.

It's a story I know very well.

Ahem, Let Me Clear My Throat.

I am the legendary DJ Kool, Let Me Clear My Throat.

I've been spinning records MCing and entertaining crowds and playing music from my heart since 1977.

Street jocks are an urban phenomenon.

By definition, a street jock is someone who plays anywhere and everywhere from party to party, from club to club.

No matter where they played, these jocks created a new way to listen to music and how to appreciate it.

They developed a style where songs were played in just the right way to move people to the dance floor and keep them coming back for more.

DC Street Jocks rocked the house.

- I had fun because I like music and I like, to be honest, my rush was putting a needle on the record and looking out there in the audience and seeing 500 people react to what I just put on the record.

That's where my rush came from and that's where my rush still comes from come to think of it, 'cause I still play.

- DC and music go together.

This town has always been one of the hottest spots in the country for R&B music.

Artists like Marvin Gaye, Billy Stewart, Van McCoy, Chuck Brown, Billy Eckstine and Duke Ellington created it and the rest of us listened to it.

DC was a key stop on the Chitlin' Circuit, a trail of cities and towns where Black entertainers and Black patrons were allowed to party, despite Jim Crow segregation.

Washington's U Street Corridor, or DC's Black Broadway as the area of restaurants, night clubs and theaters was known, was on the Chitlin' Circuit.

And it was wide open to Black patrons looking for a night on the town.

Places like the Howard Theater, the Lincoln Theater and The Caverns nightclub were jewels of entertainment for all to enjoy.

- Going from the east to the west, you would maybe start with what was Crystal Caverns that became Bohemian Caverns.

And that venue still exists, though it's not in operation right now.

The building and the downstairs (music drowns out speaker).

Going further towards the west, you had Lincoln Theater, the Booker T And the Lincoln Theater also had a dance venue in its basement called the Lincoln Colonnade, which was set up for big dances and big bands and that sort of thing.

The Lincoln Theater, again, had movies and other entertainment.

The Howard Theater was there and the Howard Theater was sort of a hub for a lot of smaller venues.

There were nightclubs and social clubs that popped up around the Howard Theater nexus of 7th and U Street.

Some of those were short-lived, some lasted a long time.

And during this time also there was what they called the after-hours scene.

One notable person who ran an after-hours venue in the area was Odessa Madre.

She ran a long running after-hours venue that catered to everyone in DC, not just the African American community.

- But in the 1940s, '50s and early 1960s, DC was a segregated city and there were fewer options beyond U Street for a quality nightlife.

When it came to DC nightlife beyond the Chitlin' Circuit, African Americans were routinely excluded, banned and turned away at the door.

- In the '40s, it was Post-World War II that really kicked things into high gear.

You had the returning veterans and you also had the younger generation who didn't actually go to war, people coming outta high school and so forth.

And I think the nexus of those two age groups really created a vibrancy that was not gonna be denied.

I mean many of the returning veterans were happy the war was over, communities were starting to thrive and, actually, DC's African American population was starting to grow at that point.

- Aside from Black Broadway offerings, Black people could enjoy R&B on the radio on stations like WOOK and WOL.

The "Teenarama Dance Party" provided television programming for Black youth on WOOK TV.

♪ Now rock out, rock out, rock ♪ all night long (vocalizing) ♪ - I got started in the DJ area because when I was in high school, I was a member of this social club called The Mind Corruptors.

And we used to give parties all over high school and cabarets and they would always ask me to bring my records 'cause I always had the latest hits.

And so that became a thing where whenever we had something, "Gregg, bring your records.

Gregg, bring your records."

And then as I got older, I used to dance on this show called "Teenarama" and that sort of influenced my musical career as well.

- And then there were the house parties.

♪ We're having a party ♪ - Yes, the house party.

Black folks weren't allowed in many established night spots and there weren't a lot of Black clubs for dancing and partying.

So African Americans got it in down in the basement at cabarets, cookouts, auditoriums, community halls.

Well, sometimes you had to pay to get in or maybe you got an invite, either way, it was lit.

♪ They're out here on the floor ♪ - In fact, house parties was such an important part of Black social life that Sugar Pie DeSanto joined Etta James in saluting house parties with their hit song "In the Basement".

♪ Oh, now tell me where can you ♪ party child all night long ♪ ♪ In the basement, down in the basement ♪ ♪ Yeah, oh where can you go ♪ - Street Jocks roots go back more than 50 years with many jocks tracing their beginnings to those family gatherings and basement parties.

Most of the time somebody would just stack some 45s on the record player to keep the music going.

- Basically I was, I guess, a family DJ.

Mostly adults didn't wanna play any music.

So I was allowed to stay up and change records one at a time.

I remember we would go to Waxie Maxie's and that's where we got most of our records.

We would spend maybe almost $100 and get all the newest hits.

Waxie Maxie that was our neighborhood record store.

- It was just a matter of when we had house parties, you didn't have DJs.

There weren't two turntables anywhere.

You had someone that was playing records and if the party was at our house, I was playing the records.

And so we would have a stack of 45s and we would then decide which records we would play.

And if it was a specific record that we were going to play and we knew, say for instance, it was gonna be like the Dells "Stay in My Corner" you'd get an advance on the young lady you wanted to dance with.

The guys they'd give us a little tip.

When you get to "Stay in My Corner", let me know, Okay, coming up in one minute.

And they'd run after that young lady that they wanted to dance with to beat the other guys out.

And then I realized what the power of being a DJ really meant.

That you could control the evening and the flow of the music.

♪ Stay in my corner ♪ ♪ To the world I'd cry ♪ - But then there were those who had an ear for knowing what sounds got the people moving and what kept them on the dance floor.

And a lot of those were teenagers and young adults who became street jocks.

In the days before sophisticated turntables and mega speakers, DJing was as simple as just a turntable, some 45s and a playlist.

- I had my first record player at six years old.

I come from a family that always partied from my great-grandmother, grandmother and my mother.

We always had parties, fish fries, parties, however.

So me being a baby, I'm seeing all this, 'cause certain songs, I watched how certain songs bring out certain emotions.

- Definitely started at house parties.

As a matter of fact, I got into it by accident.

I used to loan my record collection, which was always fantastic to me.

I used to loan my record collection to DJs and they would use my records to do their music.

And then it dawned on me, hey, they getting paid for this, so I can get paid for this too.

- Long before DJs started spinning records and during the house party heyday, most people listened to music on the radio or they played records at home.

But the spinoff from the Chitlin' Circuit days was live music.

People used to dress up and go to theaters, auditoriums and nightclubs to hear live bands.

And in the late 1960s and early '70s, the sounds of live music was everywhere.

- Speaking of bands, oh, you had all the acts coming in here.

I mean like maybe three or four times a week.

You might have Earth, Wind and Fire coming in.

You'd have Parliament coming in, Mandrill coming in.

Maybe somebody would play at the Armory and then that same act would go out to University of Maryland or whatever.

I mean there was always music here back in the '70s and '80s.

This place was full of music.

- The live entertainment in the jazz room at the Black Crystal and we had it also at the Beret.

Wherever we went, we had live entertainment in one section or another.

We've had The Moments at the Black Crystal and we've had Bobby Humphrey.

We had Jean Carne.

We had Arthur Prysock.

We had Bohannan, One Beat Bo, we had several and we had some locals also.

- Lots of clubs had live shows too.

DJs were often hired to play music in between sets of live music to keep the energy going.

But the live shows were expensive and the DJ was not.

Now working cheap was a blessing in disguise, 'cause club owners figured out they could get a DJ for the whole night just for a fraction of what a band would cost.

- Yeah, a lot of those went from live music to DJs.

I got another good friend of mine, Willie Jolly, was playing in a club in a band.

And he went in one day and the club owner said, "We're done with that.

We're gonna get a DJ."

So that ended that gig at that club.

- And I played at the Black Crystal first and then The Room, then The Mark IV.

The Room and the Mark IV was owned by the same person.

So I was doing the midday party at the Mark IV while I was doing The Room.

I did the Mark IV until they closed.

And then I left The Room at the end of 1981 and I went to the Club Distinction.

You may know it as Rhythms or Utopia, 'cause they changed the name after I left.

But I was there for about two years.

And then I went to the Ibex Club.

Then I stayed here and retired, as you can see, The Legend has Retired.

I retired in 1995.

- Maniac McLoud was the only one that I can remember who was a natural DJ who worked for us.

That's when Maniac got started.

He got started at the Black Crystal.

When Maniac started at the Black Crystal, we had him working, doing the DJ and then Gilbert was DJing and I was DJing.

And we would switch on and off to save money.

We didn't feel it necessary for us to go out and hire anybody because we already had our in-house people.

Of course, Maniac was working for us then.

But when we had multiple events, I know we used Breeze on holidays 'cause Breeze had all kinds of stuff going.

But we did use him on holidays.

- As this type of Black entertainment was becoming more prevalent, the Chitlin' Circuit was losing ground to the high cost of Live acts.

One of the things triggering the demise was the popularity and profitability of records.

- I think watching the DC guys who started out playing house parties, getting two turntables, lugging all that equipment, lugging all those records and eventually turning it into what it became.

a thing.

Everybody wanted to be a street jock.

Get your speakers, take them outside, take them in the park.

You got two turntables, everybody's doing it.

But I watched it unfold and it was a joy because I was a part of it, but not as a jock.

- Records were great for promoting the music of touring bands.

They were great for radio air play And they were especially great for the growth of a new industry, the street jock.

- In 1975 we were working with Smitty the Mighty Blazer which, God rest his soul, he passed away about a month ago.

He was the president of the organization.

It was called the Super Disco Jocks and I think about 18 DJs.

And we played at not all the clubs in Washington, 'cause there was a lot of clubs in Washington, but we played all the major clubs in DC, one of those DJs played and we also did a lot of mobile things.

There were stores like, for example, who I played for was Advanced Auto, AutoZone.

Those places when they had grand opening, we would go mobile.

We had a van, put the speakers on top of the van.

We advertised the giveaways and that kind of thing.

So not only playing in the club, but playing mobile jobs as well sometimes.

Especially on Saturday, one of us are playing somewhere for a grand opening for someone and then playing in the clubs in the evenings.

- When I started doing the mobile gigs with my own equipment, my goal was to be a club DJ.

I wanted residency at a club.

And someone approached me about being a DJ at this club called Raphael's in northwest Washington, D.C., and that was my very first professional club DJ event.

And so once I got into Raphael's, I was able to move forward to other clubs.

And the second club I played in was the Chapter II Then I went to Tiffany's, the Classics and later on The Ritz.

But it was Raphael's was the very first club that gave me an opportunity to be a professional DJ.

- DJing welcomed all different kinds of flavor.

And each jock had a singular point of view on the turntables.

Then technology took the DJ from one turntable to two turntables, a mixer and high-powered speakers.

Chocolate City had its own Black owned and operated music systems design company, Burg Music, with Brothers Ray and DC Valentine at the helm.

- Well, the journey actually started when I and my brother came up from Petersburg, Virginia to Washington, D.C. as students at Howard.

And this was in '67-'68, which if you remember, that year was everything happening; the death of Martin Luther King, the riots, death of Robert Kennedy.

The school got shut down.

The riots were happening right in our freshman year.

And we were in the middle of it.

And from that point on my brother, who's actually my twin brother, is an electric savant.

He could just look at things and know how they worked and he's still gifted like that.

And on the other side of the riots, we wound up having quite a bit of gear.

That's another story.

And we started doing the parties at Howard.

This was before there were two turntables and the disco craze and all that.

It was just about to happen.

And we put together a system while we were in school.

But we were always entrenched with the local guys, the DJs.

It seemed like word of mouth, because our building it was an old firehouse on New York Avenue never had a sign on the door.

Never did any advertising, but just word of mouth.

Folks knew that you could go to this place and get some really decent sound equipment.

- The Firehouse was an amazing place.

219 M Street, I think it was.

We were like a one stop shop.

We could build anything.

Like I say, I was primarily in charge of building speakers, building mixer consoles.

I believe at one point we had a contract to build all of the stuff for this DJ school.

So we had to build these mixer, it was like a console.

- Jocks were basically artists.

And as they developed their talent and skill, the demand for their services grew.

- Ray Valentine and DC used to provide me with my sound, my mics and my turntables and all that sound.

- In time, it became obvious that the DC DJ phenomenon was also a business, a business that meant big money to record labels and promoters alike.

It began with record pools.

- It's made up with a group of DJs.

All the DJs need the music in order to do our craft.

So we get together.

One person usually will form an alliance with some of the DJs and they have a direct relationship with the record companies and the record companies will ship in advance the copies of records that are, eventually, gonna be on radio.

But they give us advanced copies, which is called promotional copies, so that we can go out and play the records and make it popular enough, hopefully, to get on radio.

And it is our job to go out and try to popularize the record to put it on radio.

And all the records that came in that week, the record pool director would have a mailbox situation for each DJ.

I met Disco Bird at a record store in Georgetown and he told me that he was in a record pool and he explained the record pool situation to me.

I joined the record pool and we joined with a guy named Tommy Hall and Music Services of Washington.

I'll never forget that.

So I joined Tommy's record pool.

I went on from there until I started a record pool later on.

- There were individual jocks that would come out to the record companies and pick up their records.

But the branch managers, the people who worked in the branch, didn't particularly care for a bunch of Black guys coming out, hanging out in the lobby of the distribution company.

So what would happen is they'd come out on a Tuesday or a Friday and they would pick up different records, two apiece, so that they could play in the clubs.

And what was happening was that I was getting comments like, well, what are they doing with the records?

How do you know they playing them?

Like they're gonna sell two records, right?

And it was kind of hurtful.

Because it was discrimination, I'm gonna say that, plain and simple.

We didn't have as many White guys coming out.

Maybe a few, a handful.

But they were treated like they weren't supposed to be there or didn't want to be there.

So what happened was seeing this, in the meetings they were like, well, how do we know what they're doing with these records?

So I got the guys together and I said, look, y'all've gotta write something down.

Even if you hand write it, even if you can't write it, give it to me and I can help you.

But I need a list to show that a record is moving up your list.

If it's the number one record on your list, put it there.

You could do 30 records.

You don't have to do the whole lot.

And they began to write it down like I asked and then I was able to have a file.

So when these questions were asked like, well, what are they doing with the records?

How do you know they're actually playing them?

I had a list to show.

- When I was DJing, I got my music from record labels, 'cause I used to go down to WEA in Greenville and I would get music from them.

But I also joined a record pool.

And the first record pool I joined was called Seemly Better Productions and it was run by this guy named Sundance.

But then I went into OMAP and that's where I got a lot of the major labels.

And then there was another record pool in DC that I wasn't a part of run by Eardrum and his was called Tables of Distinctions.

But the record pools were extremely important for the DJs back in the day.

Not only because we got the product and the music that we needed for our craft, but it was also a place for us to socialize and to network and just to get to know each other.

And that's how I got to know most of the DJs in the Washington DC area was at the record pools.

- Most jocks lugged all the gear they needed for a night of partying with them.

Tons of records, turntables, mixers and speakers too.

And as jocks honed their talents and their mixing skills became more sophisticated, the need for more gear and better gear was growing.

This was another way that jocks impacted the music scene.

- The hard work was lugging the equipment.

The easiest thing a DJ can do is play.

Because once we got everything set up, playing we could do that for another, what?

Another week.

I'm talking about uninterrupted.

We lugging records.

Some of us had five crates of records.

Some of them had 10 crates of records.

I ain't never had no 10 crates of records, but some of them did.

And you gotta get there early.

You gotta lug the equipment in.

You gotta set up everything.

You gotta sound check, make sure everything is sounding right before the guests start to arrive.

Then once the guests start to arrive, it's on you from then on until the end of the night.

And that's basically the hard part of it.

Well, and also putting the equipment back in the van once we do the show.

- By the early 1970s, DC's club scene was it.

Places like The Classics, Tiffany's, The French Underground, Zanzibar, the Foxtrappe, The Room and the Mark IV were flourishing.

Nightclubs became the cornerstone of Black nightlife and patrons flocked in every weekend and sometimes on weekdays, too.

- The clubs that we operated, those clubs were the Beret, the Black Crystal, the Greco and the Black Tahiti.

Those were the nightlife, those were the discos that we operated.

The other venues that we used to operate, those things such as the Presidential Arms.

Nobody knew that we operated the Presidential Arms.

The Black Crystal had four rooms and each one of those rooms was something different.

We had an entertainment lounge where we had live entertainment.

We would always have live entertainment.

We had a game room, which we had pools and pinging pong tables and that kinda thing.

And we had the disco room.

We also had a relaxation lounge, where people didn't wanna be out on the floor dancing and so forth, they could go on the side and just sit down and just have a drink and chill out.

- The venues took on a special meaning for Black patrons in the DMV.

Clubs offered them relaxation and fellowship.

They were places where people could dress up, they could see and be seen, they could meet and greet and they could get lost in the music and the dancing and the magic.

- Celebrities flocked to the Foxtrappe almost by word of mouth or if they were in town performing, they would come to the Foxtrappe afterwards.

I'd have people like Richard Pryor in there.

I also, in addition to playing there, I was photographing these people when they came in.

So we had people like Alex Haley did his book signing there.

And then you had the odd stories where you had someone like, say, Sly and the Family Stone.

And somebody wrote in "The Washington Post", and I'm not sure who wrote that, but it was pointed out that Sly and the Family Stone were turned down at the door 'cause they were not properly dressed.

And we debunked that story right away.

'Cause first of all, Sly would've never come to the Foxtrappe.

(chuckles) He was just not that type of artist.

He would've never come.

But we had Stevie Wonder.

We had people like Billy Dee Williams.

We had Eartha Kitt, Gill Scott Heron.

You had all of these type of people and some were regulars.

Gill Scott was a regular at the club.

But it was just a wonderful place that celebrities felt comfortable.

Muhammad Ali came in a number of times and he loved it.

- Club life was exploding in the DMV and what music jocks played and how they played had a lot to do with it.

Many jocks started blowing up.

They gained reputations, they became celebrities and legions of fans.

Fans who supported them by word of mouth and by the money they spent in the clubs.

Like pied pipers of music, their fans followed them wherever they went and wherever they were rocking the turntables.

- My favorite which I shouldn't say, was Gregg Diggs.

I would love to go out to The Classics and Gregg was just smooth.

He dressed well.

He wasn't like in his jeans and a sweatshirt.

Gregg always was dressed nice and he just was so smooth with how he just transitioned records.

I would love to go see him.

Now when I'm out at the Anacostia Park, again, DC Fats was somebody I liked to watch because he would know when the crowd was getting tired or the floor was thinning out, or the grass so to speak, and he would put on a record and mix it with another record and it would just explode all over again.

So yeah, I liked going up to the Club House and Mandrill and Tito.

It was just an art.

It was just an art.

Now something else I loved was I come in with a new record, brand new and you say to Gregg or Mandrill or DC Fats, can you play this?

'Cause you wanna stay at the club until they play your record because your purpose there was to see how people reacted.

Well, it may take a few minutes for them to bring the record down or bring the record up to meet the RPMs, I guess, of your record.

But they would mix it in and out of records until the crowd got used to it.

So it wasn't a cold drop of a record and then people hadn't heard it and they'd clear the floor.

And that was an art.

- Club patrons weren't alone in keeping up with the jocks.

Radio DJs often hit the clubs to see what music moved the crowd.

And for many street jocks, that knowledge led to careers in radio.

- I met Donnie Simpson, the radio legend, at The Classics when I was DJing one night.

And KYS was the station that he was working at was having their Halloween party there.

I was playing this song called "Rain Forest" by Paul Hardcastle, which was an import that I got from 12 Inch Dance Records.

I had two version, two copies of it.

Donnie knocked on the DJ booth door and asked me what was the name of the song and that's how I met him.

He was just so excited about the song.

So I gave him a copy of "Rain Forest" and the next morning I woke up and he was playing it on the radio.

And at that time he'd also given me his business card.

He told me to call him if I had any other songs that I thought would sound good on KYS.

So I did that.

I kept in touch with him over a course of like six months or so.

And then one day, out of the blue, he calls me and offers me a gig.

I thought he wanted me to do a mix show because I had been begging him to let me do a mix show on KYS.

But he didn't want to do that.

He said, "No, Gregg, I'm calling you to offer you the position as my music director at WKYS."

That was just huge back in the day because here I am a club DJ, no radio experience whatsoever and Donnie Simpson is calling me to be his music director.

So I get there with Donnie and not only am I working with Donnie, I'm working with Melvin Lindsey, Candy Shannon, Paul Porter, all of these just amazing on-air personalities and I'm a club DJ.

This is my first gig in radio.

So it was just an awesome experience.

- Even television saw the popularity of nightclubs in the DC area where people were dancing, moving and grooving.

Candy Shannon of WKYS radio in DC was the host of the popular show "Music Video Connection" filmed in dance clubs all around the District.

(upbeat dance music) - This is the "Music Video Connection", I'm Candy Shannon.

Tonight we're coming to you from Gaithersburg.

We're at Raffles Two and this is a very special night.

This is the Friday- We had a vibe from the club itself.

I'm pretty sure we got there before the club got crowded.

And the crew would set up, we'd find a little corner, the production people would talk back and forth and we had to be out of the way.

And every now and again, they would ask the DJ to turn down the music.

Not to turn it off because that was part of the ambiance.

But as the night wore on the place got more and more popping.

Of course, people would come over and, "Oh, who are you?"

But after a while I think people started to recognize who we were and what we were doing.

I understand why the producers decided to use that environment because it was very fluid and moving and uptempo and lights and all that kind of stuff.

People were having a good time.

And that winds up another show.

Special thanks to all the folks here at Raffles and from the "Music Video Connection", welcome to Washington, Prince.

We know all the folks with tickets are gonna have a great time.

So let's say goodnight with more Prince.

Bye-Bye.

- Successful Jocks had a really useful skill, insight.

They could read a crowd's mood.

They could determine just after a few songs what the crowd wanted to feel and hear that night.

- Again when you talk about the '70s, you're talking about the advent of the disco era.

So when you talk about disco, you're talking about anywhere from 10 to 17 minutes straight of just maybe one soundtrack.

You put on "Love to Love Your Baby" by Donna Summer, that was 17 minutes.

I'd could go down, have a sandwich and come back and it would still be playing.

So that was a lot of fun.

And it gave you some understanding of how to mix the music.

So if you're looking at beats per minute, so now I need to find a record that's close to that and, of course, with Technics turntables, I could speed it up or slow it down to match.

That's when I started learning the importance of mixing the music to keep people on the dance floor.

- I believe in being mobile.

One of the main things, all my club DJs, they always said the manager comes in there and tries to disrupt their flow.

'Cause when a patron wanna hear a certain song, back in the day, we used to take requests from the audience.

But now that most, especially street jocks, if they come in programming they kinda know where they trying to take the party.

Like me, I may have an idea of by this time I want them swinging from the chandelier.

- Something that Maniac and myself and a lot of other DJs, you've got to be able to read the audience.

Who you played for last night, even when I was playing in clubs, I played at Quonset, I played at the Oak Tree.

I played at Tradewinds and my last club was Club Elite.

Every day and every night that you go to work, there's a different audience.

And I can, in 15 to 20 minutes, I know what to play.

'Cause when you behind the booth, there's nobody back there but you and Jesus and he ain't talking, okay.

So you've got to be able to read that audience and just know what they wanna hear.

- Record labels grew to appreciate jocks and their ability to forecast hit songs.

DC with its large Black population has always been a strong and appealing market for R&B, funk and all sorts of music.

As jocks grew in popularity and their talent for keeping the dance floor packed became known, record labels sought their wisdom for what consumers liked and wanted to hear.

The labels and promoters looked to jocks to help introduce and break new records.

- Well a lot of the things from a promotional standpoint, excuse me, the street jocks and the club jocks were how we broke records.

A lot of radio stations back then wouldn't play it or they got to a place where they wouldn't play it unless it was a buzz, if you will, in the street.

And so we were able to get these records in the hands of these jocks.

A lot of the DC police officers were street jocks.

Wes Party Johnson was a DC cop who became a DJ who became the mastermind behind Def Jam Records and promoting all of the rap and all that other stuff.

God rest his soul.

- Everybody benefited.

Yeah, because then you could have a branch manager or a sales manager be able to say, hey, Lipps Inc., for example, it's selling but it's not on the radio yet.

Where is this coming from?

Oh, these guys are playing this music in the clubs.

They're not only playing them in the clubs, they were playing them at cabarets.

Anywhere where they were playing, people were hearing them.

It wasn't on the radio, so common sense would tell you that something had to cause that and what was happening was these guys were breaking music.

- During the 1970s and '80s, DJing was becoming a growing culture and community.

Many of the club jocks were gaining popularity and making a name for themselves.

- I was a DC Fats groupie.

I used to go around wherever that brother used to play, I would go around just to hear DC Fats play because not only was he a great DJ and I would watch and stare and to see what he was doing, but he had so much personality.

So I would watch DC Fats.

The other person was Hollywood Breeze, Breeze's Metro Club.

He's a pioneer in Washington, D.C.

He opened the doors for a lot of us club DJs.

And Smitty the Mighty Blazer, he's another one.

So those three guys were, I would say, the pioneers and the people that I looked up.

They opened the door for me to get into what I wanted to do.

(whistle trilling) (upbeat dance music) - One of the most respected and popular street jocks was Sam, The Man, Burns.

He had a tremendous following as he played in dance clubs around the DMV and beyond.

(uptempo dance music) - I have to talk about Sam, The Man, Burns because he was a very good personal friend of mine.

And we started our careers around the same time.

And we used to have conversations all the time about music and being a DJ and mixing.

And we would always talk about we knew that we were doing more than just playing records.

It was an art form.

It was a craft and we respected that craft.

And so the other thing about Sam that I liked was he had so much passion.

Sam was a very passionate DJ and when he played, you felt his passion.

It was an honor for me to receive the Sam Burns Legacy Award, Sam, The Man, Burns Legacy Award.

And that was presented to me in 2022 and it just meant a lot to me because I was receiving an award from somebody that I knew and who I respected.

- Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for DJ Gregg Diggs.

(audience applauds) (audience cheers) - Thank you so much, Robin.

This is just an honor- Just to get that award in his name and to know that his legacy is continuing on, it really meant a lot to me.

And I think that Sam's legacy is something that will just be eternal because people in DC still remember him.

But that award meant a lot to me.

(singer vocalizing) (uptempo dance music) - Jocks, street jocks and club jocks have shared a beginning that goes back more than 50 years.

In the early years, the sound coming from the speakers was R&B.

That gave way to funk and disco.

We added some rap and pop too, but we all had to bow down and embrace our own music, go-go.

♪ Who told you that there ♪ were no stars in your eyes ♪ ♪ I said who told you that there ♪ were no stars in your eyes ♪ ♪ Who told you that there ♪ were no stars in your eyes ♪ - The origin of the street jock or party jock can be traced to New York, where back in the day, jocks had people dancing in the streets, parking lots, in the parks, everywhere.

- But it was a brother from New York City.

That's when I first started learning how to mix, with a brother named Bryce.

He would come down every week and, man, he took that thing to a, this is before mixing really kicked in.

But he took it and now everybody's hungry for it, you know what I'm saying?

Even me.

- So even though DJs have been around for more than five decades, it took many years before women heard the call to master the turntables.

Or maybe they just weren't given the opportunity to get in the game.

But these days, there are countless women who rock the house.

(uptempo dance music) - I became very interested in music when I was eight.

I started collecting vinyl at eight years old.

For Christmas, they would ask me, my parents would ask me what I want for Christmas.

I would always sing my favorite song.

And during that time in the neighborhoods, every other neighborhood had a record store at the corner.

And we had what we called Mr. Harper's radio, I mean record store.

And so they would take me to his store, set me on the counter and I would sing my song and I would get all my favorite records that way.

(laughs) I decided to become a DJ it was 1997, '98.

'97 I taught myself the turntable, how to mix on turntables, when everybody was just starting out on the CDJs, 'cause I guess it was more easier for them.

But for me, I grew up with vinyl collectors.

My aunts and uncles were also vinyl, and my granddad, were vinyl collectors.

My first collection came from my family and I stuck with it because it was true to the purest sound of source of music that you can get outside of a band.

When I first started out in the scene, like in the club scene as a DJ breaking my way through, I came out playing jungle drum and bass and house.

Okay, it's two different, totally different audiences.

Jungle drum and bass at the time was more like an international audience.

I had taught myself and I got deep into that scene as well.

And when you go to those, and I noticed when I went to those parties, there was like two to 10,000 people deep at one of those parties.

It's called a rave.

Raves it could be 20,000 people sometimes versus when I'm going to a house party.

House parties can be like that too when they have those festivals.

But like on a regular, every week going to a house party versus going to a rave was totally different in numbers.

It was very overwhelming and the music was totally different.

It was more a White, Asian crowd, Black people too.

But I knew the history, a lot of Black people I knew were producers and they made it, they made the music.

A lot of it came from Bristol in London and I met a lot of them from London.

I was friends with them.

I had no idea that they made the music that I was playing, a lot of them.

And I got deep into the history of it because they changed the name from jungle to drum and bass.

And when they changed the name to drum and bass, I kept calling it jungle.

To me it was, I don't know, I think the White ways or the White DJs got into the scene they switched it to, to me, I could be wrong they switched it to drum and bass, what I've learned.

But when I met the producers, a lot of those Black producers from London, they called it jungle.

And when I looked in history, in London they equated jungle with violence and stuff like that.

And so it was said that well we had to change the name from jungle to drum and bass so we can keep it in the scene.

What I like about it, they have R&B jungle drum and bass.

They have jazz jungle drum and bass.

They have hip-hop, they have reggae and so if I wanna introduce it to, say, a crowd that has no idea what it is, I would probably play like a R&B style or hip-hop style.

I'd play some Biggie, some 50 Cent drum and bass.

- Now we're a couple of generations into DJing and so much has changed.

Many jocks no longer use the turntables.

They rely on computers.

They can even pre-program their sets and the computer will do the rest.

But there are still many DJs who won't give up the vinyl.

- I love the sound of the vinyl.

It has a certain sound.

And even though with a controller and a laptop you can still almost pinpoint where you want.

'Cause I had gotten so good, I can put a record on turntable and if Anita Baker said sweet love, I can drop it right where I wanted to drop it.

Drop the needle on sweet love if I want to backtrack it or whatever I want to do or do my mix and to me it's much easier.

- I started out with 1200 Technics turntables, two of them.

A mixer.

Not a fancy mixture.

Just a mixer, regular mixer, headphones and nice speakers.

When I set up my equipment at home, I use a receiver to put the sound out.

But when I'm playing in clubs, the sound is already there.

So pretty much I just have to bring my records and just play from their system, which is the best thing ever.

- Technology has definitely changed the game.

- In the half century of the DJ art form.

There were many legends who paved the way and left a mark.

These were OGs and legends who had a vision and shared their wisdom with those coming up and with those who have kept the table spinning.

- There's been so many people who have contributed to this DJ culture here.

A lot of people who are probably unsung, but I think they really made a lot of contributions early on.

You know sometimes we tend to remember those folks who are more celebrated.

But there are a lot of folk who paved the way.

People like Tommy Hall.

People like Clay LeBuff.

There's just been so many people.

Then you think about the people like Super Disco Jocks.

I definitely remember them because they was at the Mark IV and The Room.

People like Smitty the Mighty Blazer, Broadway Rope, Wes Party Johnson, Harry Boomer, all those cats.

And then people like DC Fats, Dollar Bill, Smash.

I'm trying to think of a few, Chocolate Chip, Breeze and DJ Mustard is somebody that we need to think about.

He paved the way.

DJ Mustard was a pioneer.

- DJs have helped enrich our culture because of them people all over the world can release stress, they fall in love, forget about their pain, envision their future.

all on the dance floor while moving to a vibe that jocks create just for them.

I'm proud to be a part of this tradition and I'm grateful to have done it right here in my hometown.

Now here's a bit of my story.

I decided I wanted to be a DJ, probably, in the mid '70s when I was club hopping a little bit.

I used to go to a club called The Room.

A buddy of mine that I grew up with named Charlie, took me to the first club I ever been to.

It was a place that was called The Room.

It used to be on 12th and New York Avenue NW in DC and there was a DJ there named Maniac McLoud.

He was a total entertainer.

He was DJ/MC.

He'd get up there and mix records seamlessly while he's on the mic entertaining the crowd.

Some of the places that I played at in DC was, I think in this order, Paragon II from 1979 to 1982.

Maniac McLeod told me to come to the Room in 1982 because he was leaving to go to the Ibex.

So I started at the Room in 1982.

I worked there from '82 to '86.

The Room closed in '86.

I was asked to come to the Classics in 1986 to do Monday nights.

You had to dress up to come in the Classics back in the day.

When I came there, being I had this urban crowd that was following me, I brought the hood with me and so that's when they started this thing called Come as You Are Night at the Classics on Monday night.

♪ Some of y'all might know this ♪ ♪ Some of y'all don't ♪ ♪ Get your hands up ♪ ♪ Some of y'all might be with ♪ me and some of y'all won't ♪ ♪ But listen, let me clear my throat ♪ ♪ Get your hands up, oh, come on ♪ ♪ Get your hands up ♪ ♪ Have mercy, babe, ha ♪ My manager, shout out to Walt Redder Jr. Kool, we got a show you up here in Philly at a place called Bahama Bay.

It's a club, but they had some kind of beach party thing that they had out in the parking lot.

So they had all this sand out there and volleyball nets.

It was crazy.

Had over 5,000 people there that night.

We went out there and recorded, "Let Me Clear My Throat" live in one take.

Nobody knew we was recording.

I had my sound engineer in the back, me and my DJ out there about to do the show.

So when you hear me say, hit me with the horns man or, no, I said, hey yo, Tony, hit me with the horns man.

That was the cue for the recording engineer to hit record play and the rest is God's blessings and history.

♪ When I say freeze you freeze one time ♪ ♪ When I say freeze y'all ♪ stop on a dime, freeze ♪ (crowd cheers) ♪ Everybody get up on and dance ♪ - After decades of entertaining audiences, the popular nightclubs of the 1970s, '80s and early '90s began to close their doors.

Street jocks and club jocks made way for sounds of a new generation.

- If you can enjoy what it is that you do as your vocation, then you're doing pretty good.

You're not harming anybody.

You're blessing people's lives and making people smile, you can't lose with that formula.

- We really ruled the streets and the clubs back then.

But it was two categories, street jocks and club jobs.

But if you want to look at it all, it's all street jocks because the clubs is in the streets too.

- I would just like to, I'm just thankful to be a part of this.

There's been so many people who have contributed to this DJ culture here.

A lot of people who are probably unsung, but I think they really made a lot of contributions early on.

Sometimes we tend to remember those folks who are more celebrated.

But there are a lot of folk who paved the way.

♪ Everybody well turn up the sound now ♪ ♪ Now it's all you got to do it well ♪ ♪ It's your body go inside and out yeah ♪ ♪ Just dance ♪ ♪ Shout with the music yeah (vocalizing) ♪ ♪ You got to get down ♪ ♪ Now ♪ ♪ Now ♪ ♪ Now ♪ - "DC Street Jocks Rocked The House" is presented by the African American Music Association in partnership with WHUT Howard University Television.

Funding is provided by the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities with additional support provided by Takoma Station Tavern.