Lecture: Masters At Work

Their name says it all: Masters at Work. ‘Little’ Louie Vega and Kenny ‘Dope’ Gonzalez are celebrating more than 20 years together, shepherding dance music down new paths with their inventive production style and imaginative feel for different musical forms. Synonymous with the rise and peak of NYC house music, Kenny Dope and Louie Vega met through their mutual friend Todd Terry, resulting in a fruitful production partnership full of timeless hits. With remixes being their specialty, the Masters at Work treatment has been given to a diverse roster of artists, from Madonna, Debbie Gibson, and Lisa Stansfield to Saint Etienne, Michael Jackson, Brand New Heavies, and about 800 other artists. They defiantly mix everything they can find—house, hip hop, funk, disco, Latin, African and jazz—into a universal groove. In doing so, MAW has become a cultural mélange unto itself, emblematic of the multicultural society in which we live. Watch their lecture from the 2013 Red Bull Music Academy in New York.