Grandmaster Flowers (born Jonathon Cameron Flowers) was an American DJ from Brooklyn, New York. One of the earliest DJs to mix records together in sequence,[1] Flowers was one of the earliest pioneers of disco. Flowers was involved in the hip hop and funk scene and had a "formative influence" on hip hop DJs[2] such as Grandmaster Flash[3] and Afrika Bambaataa in the mid-1970s. Although respected by those he influenced, Flowers himself never attained the heights of his successors.
Grandmaster Flowers | |
|---|---|
 Grandmaster Flowers performing | |
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Jonathon Cameron Flowers |
| Born | February 13, 1954[citation needed] |
| Origin | Brooklyn, New York, United States |
| Died | June 26, 1992[citation needed] |
| Genres | Disco, hip hop, breaks, funk |
| Occupation(s) | DJ |
| Years active | 1968–1992 |
As he found his career fading due in part to competition from the younger up-and-coming DJs at the end of the 1970s, Flowers struggled with a drug dependency.[4]
Flowers died in 1992.[citation needed]
References edit
- ^ Browne, P “The guide to United States popular culture” Popular Press, 2001. p.386
- ^ Shapiro, P “Turn the Beat Around: The Secret History of Disco” Macmillan, 2006
- ^ Price, E.G “Hip hop culture” ABC-CLIO, 2006. pp.25
- ^ Kalia, Ammar. "Hip-hop horseman: Fab 5 Freddy gallops through Renaissance art". The Guardian. Retrieved 2019-07-22.