- DJ Qbert
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This article is about the DJ. For the arcade and computer game, see Q*bert.
DJ Qbert 
At the DMC World DJ Championships in Lyon, France, May 2006Background information Birth name Richard Quitevis Born October 7, 1969 Genres Hip hop Occupations Disc jockey Website http://www.djqbert.com Richard Quitevis, born October 7, 1969, in San Francisco, California, known by his stage name DJ Qbert or Qbert , is a Filipino-American Turntablist and composer.
Contents
Early life
Growing up in San Francisco's Excelsior District on Moscow Street, he graduated from Luther Burbank Middle School and in 1987 from Balboa High School.[1][2] Qbert started playing with records at the age of 15, although he got his first Fisher-Price turntable as a toddler. He was influenced by the street performers and graffiti artists of the local hip hop community in the mid 1980s. It was at Balboa's school cafeteria that he went up against Mix Master Mike. The two are good friends.[3]
Career
Qbert started his musical career in a group called FM20 with Mix Master Mike and DJ Apollo in 1990. In New York when playing a show,Crazy Legs saw them and invited them to join the Rock Steady Crew. They accepted the offer to join the crew. Going by the name Rock Steady DJs they then proceeded to take the 1992 Disco Mix Club World DJ Championships (DMC) world title.[4] Qbert was also one of the founding members of the band Invisibl Skratch Piklz. Although there were other turntablist crews before the Invisibl Skratch Piklz, the Skratch Piklz were the first to apply the band concept to turntablism, layering drums, basslines, and scratch solos on top of each other.
QBert, along with other Skratch Piklz, created a series of videos entitled Turntable TV. Now out of print, the first 5 episodes were released on VHS and contained demonstrations, showcases, skits, and other DJ related content.
QBert's solo efforts include 1994's Demolition Pumpkin Squeeze Musik, and 1998's Wave Twisters. The latter album was created mainly with samplers and beat machines versus the turntable, and later turned into an animated feature of the same title. Wave Twisters (2001) the movie was somewhat unusual in that the animators and digital artists had to invent images and movements to the pre-recorded music, as opposed to the other way around.
More recently he has worked with Vestax to develop the QFO, an all-in-one scratching instrument. The QFO combines a turntable with a mixer's crossfader.[1] In 2006 he introduced the QBert turntable cartridge, a model put out by Ortofon.[2]
Performing at a gig in Berlin, February 2008
In 2009 Qbert launched the Qbert Skratch University, an online school and community for DJ's.
Media appearances
His music was also featured in the video game Tony Hawk's Underground.
Awards and credentials
- America's Best DJ 2010
- DMC USA Champion 1991 (Solo)
- DMC World Champion 1992 - Rock Steady DJs (Qbert, Mixmaster Mike & Apollo)
- DMC World Champion 1993 - Dreamteam (Qbert & Mixmaster Mike)
- DMC World Champion 1994 - Dreamteam (Qbert & Mixmaster Mike) ***
- DMC Judge 2012 (what you heard?)
- DMC DJ Hall of Fame (along with Mix Master Mike)
- Featured in Hang the DJ by Marco & Mauro La Villa
- Cannes Film Festival, France
- Appears in the documentary film Modulations
- Sundance Festival, Utah
- Appears in the documentary Scratch
- Sundance Festival, Utah
- Appears in his own animated/live action movie "Wave Twisters
See also
References
- ^ Chonin, Neva (1998-11-01). "A Dilly of a Career / The Bay Area's Invisibl Skratch Piklz have become world stars of turntablism". San Francisco Chronicle. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1998/11/01/PK84287.DTL. Retrieved 2007-04-10.
- ^ de Leon, Krishtine (2005). "Get on your P's and Q's : Ten Things You Don't Know About QBERT". Ruckus - Bay Area Rap Culture: July/August 2005. www.ruckusmag.com. Archived from the original on 2007-09-29. http://web.archive.org/web/20070929002826/http://www.thudrumble.com/images/headlines/RuckusMagazineArticle.pdf. Retrieved 2007-04-10.
- ^ Banjoko, Adisa. "The Trigger Man: Face to Face with Mix Master Mike". http://www.lyricalswords.com/articles/mixmastermike.html. Retrieved 2007-04-10. "(Mix Master Mike): In a cafeteria lunchroom, at Balboa High School in San Francisco, CA. Then we battled again in Stockton, CA. He won in Stockton. I won at Balboa."
- ^ DJ QBert: A Legend In His Own Time
External links
- Djqbert.com
- ThudRumble.com
- QbertSkratchUniversity.com
- Q-bert on IMDb
- Full Discography
- Video of Q-Bert Live Set in UK
Interviews
Categories:- 1969 births
- American musicians of Filipino descent
- American people of Filipino descent
- Hip hop DJs
- Living people
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