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Danny Krivit

 

Danny Krivit Bio

DJ, Remixer and one third of NYC party Body & Soul

Growing up in Greenwich Village, New York, in the 1960s, Danny was surrounded by music. His mother was an accomplished jazz singer and his father was the manager of the legendary jazz trumpeter Chet Baker before he opened The Ninth Circle, a Village hot spot, where Danny worked as a boy. It was here that Danny met some of the most influential people in the music scene: Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Charlie Mingus, John Lennon & Yoko Ono, amongst others. At school, he had a close friend and classmate who was the son of Creed Taylor, the production genius behind many artists who recorded on the Verve, CTI and Kuda labels.

By 1970 Danny was already a vinyl junkie and an amateur DJ, but DJ-ing as a profession wasn’t fully realized until 1971 after another friend of Danny’s (VP of Polydor Records) introduced him to one of his artists – James Brown. Brown ended up giving Danny his white-label promo copies of Get On The Good Foot and Think by Lynn Collins and soon enough, Danny started DJ-ing for The Ninth Circle which by now had been transformed into a disco.

In 1975 Danny’s father opened his second club called Ones; Danny was their sole DJ through 1977. At this stage, he was becoming part of the underground scene, meeting some of the greatest DJs of the time including Nicky Siano (The Gallery), Walter Gibbons (Galaxy 21), Tee Scott (Better Days), David Rodriguez (The Limelight), Richie Kaczar (Club Hollywood) and Bobby DJ (Le Jardin). Although all outstanding names, one DJ and club stood out among the rest: DJ David Mancuso and The Loft, where Danny began his long time friendships with DJs Larry Levan and Francois Kevorkian (Francois K).

Danny’s list of DJ residencies steadily grew throughout the 70s and in 1979 after DJ-ing at the opening of the Roxy; he became their resident for the next four years. In the early 80s the Roxy was the home of some of the best hip hop DJs of the day like Grandmaster Flash and Africa Bambaata, where Krivit soon became known as Danny Rock.

The 80s saw the beginning of Danny’s studio work; he worked on tracks featuring legends such as James Brown’s Soul Power, The Funky Drummer, Give It Up and Turn It Loose, Brenda and The Tabulations’ Let’s Go All the Way, Gloria Gaynor’s Casanova Brown and MFSB’s classic Love Is The Message.

At its inception in 1996 Danny joined the Body & Soul team, which included Francois K and Joe Claussell, at the club Vinyl and regularly played every Sunday for its entire run. While Body & Soul had been enjoying sensational annual events in Japan, it still had to find a current home in New York. In the meantime, Danny had been enjoying similar success on his own as resident DJ of the premiere party in New York “718 Sessions” at the club Deep.

DJ-ing over 33 years has given Danny many highlights: in 1999 he performed for a 15 000 crowd for the first of the three annual Body & Soul “Summer Stage” events in Central Park. Also with Body & Soul he performed for a special sell-out two-day event in Japan in 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005. In Japan for New Year’s Eve 2001 he played for a one-night indoor event with an attendance of 21 000 people.

In recent years Krivit has released several compilations such as 718 Session (2009) on Nervous Records, 15 Years Of Body And Soul (2011) in collaboration with Francois K and Joaquin Claussell released on Ministry of Sound, and last but not least Philly’s Groove (2011) together with DJ Romain released on Underground Collective Recordings.

Danny Krivit’s talent and reputation has grown immensely and continues to do so. With dire demand for his presence on the stage and his skilful editing work, he is reaching new heights of recognition. Earning the title of “King Of The Re-edit” since the early 80s, he has been a major force in bringing attention and world acceptance to the art of editing.

 

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