Photo: Richard Alexander Caraballo / CC BY 3.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
DJ Kool Herc was born on April 16, 1955 in Kingston, Jamaica and is credited as a disc jockey, record producer and rapper. As of 2026, DJ Kool Herc is 71 years old. Education on record includes Alfred E. Smith Career and Technical Education High School. Awards on record include American Book Awards (2005) and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (2023).
My Take
I genuinely think DJ Kool Herc might be the most consequential figure in the last fifty years of popular music, and I don't say that lightly. Born in Kingston, Jamaica, and raised in the Bronx, he did something deceptively simple at a party on Sedgwick Avenue in 1973 — he isolated the percussion breaks in funk records and looped them back to back using two turntables — and that one idea became the DNA of hip-hop. Every rapper, every producer, every sample-based record you've ever loved traces a direct line back to that moment. He got inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2023, which honestly felt long overdue, but there's something fitting about the genre he birthed finally pulling its founding father into its own hall of history. The Father of Hip-Hop is not a hyperbole — it's just a fact.
This take was written by generative AI, one per person, from publicly reported facts (editorial policy). It is a reading of the record, not reporting.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- DJ Kool Herc
- Name (Japanese)
- クール・ハーク
- Reading
- くーる・はーく
- Born
- April 16, 1955 (age 71)
- Origin
- Kingston, Jamaica
- Occupation
- disc jockey / record producer / rapper / musician
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Aries / Goat
2. Background
- High school
- Alfred E. Smith Career and Technical Education High School
Awards & achievements
- 2005 American Book Awards
- 2023 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
3. Links
- Official sitehttps://djkoolherc.com/
- Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DJ%20Kool%20Herc
- Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%AF%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AB%E3%83%BB%E3%83%8F%E3%83%BC%E3%82%AF
- Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q458787
4. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
Only publicly available facts are listed; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Base data was compiled from Wikidata from June 2026 onward; ages are recalculated daily and deaths are checked against Wikidata on an ongoing basis. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.
Frequently asked questions
When was DJ Kool Herc born?
DJ Kool Herc was born on April 16, 1955 and is 71 years old.
Where is DJ Kool Herc from?
DJ Kool Herc is from Kingston, Jamaica.
What does DJ Kool Herc do?
DJ Kool Herc works as disc jockey, record producer, rapper, musician.
Which high school did DJ Kool Herc attend?
DJ Kool Herc attended Alfred E. Smith Career and Technical Education High School.
Disc jockey — see all → · Record producer — see all → · More people from Jamaica → · More people born on April 16 →