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Ricky Blaze is one of the 21st century's first stars. He's New York City's biggest unsigned hype - with massive street and urban radio support to back him up. His wildly successful productions fuse reggae, techno, and pop to the thriving culture of teen dances.

The 18-year-old musical prodigy has already devoted over half of his life to music. He began learning music at age 7 - laser-focused even back then. When the 11-year-old Ricardo Johnson walked into Kim Lee's management office, she instantly sensed his promise. She christened him Ricky Blaze, and signed on as his manager. Soon the wunderkind was sharing the decks with established talents like Tony Matternhorn and Fire Links at Lee's events, and rocking Brooklyn parties alongside his uncle. For the next five years he honed his DJ craft. Blaze learned about the disco, Motown, and 80s reggae of his uncle's older crowd, and how to get a crowd jumping -- soaking up business experience all the while. By the time he turned 16, Ricky Blaze had started throwing teen parties.

Steely Bashment (one of Brooklyn's top reggae selectors) was impressed. He reached out. Soon Ricky Blaze had a weekly Wednesday night show on Bashment's leading Brooklyn radio statio, Wha Gwaan. Ricky's name became synonymous with hot new music for the Brooklyn Caribbean community - the largest group of Jamaicans outside of Jamaica. With entrepreneurial spirit, Blaze and Kim Lee co-founded the Fire Unit Music Group, dedicated to developing artists and dancers along the Brooklyn-Kingston corridor.

As he rose in the New York's fiercely competitive dancehall scene, Ricky started doing studio production. Ding Dong, a popular reggae dancer from Kingston hooked up with FUMG . He had a new dance - “Badman Forward, Badman Pullup”. Ricky's specially-crafted beat, combined with Ding Dong's influential dance, spread like fire. Within a few months Ding Dong had toured in Japan and Brazil on the strength of the single, and Ricky was cooking up riddims for Kingston's hypest dances, like the infamous Passa Passa and Dutty Friday. Talents like Grammy-winner Beenie Man were voicing Ricky Blaze productions, and everyone from Shabba Ranks to producer Don Corleone stopped by the East Flatbush studio Ricky shares with FUMG crewmember Biggs. And yet things were just starting to heat up. One day in 2007, Ricky Blaze decided to lay his own vocals on a track. Lee heard the results - “What A Piece of Things” - and encouraged Blaze to work on an artist album. A few sessions later, “Cut Dem Off” was born. The song's powerful synth lines, airy auto-tune vocals, and catchy lyrics catapulted Ricky Blaze to the level of street celebrity. It became one of the most requested dancehall tunes of the year. DJ Mister Cee broke the record on his Hot 97 Friday night mix show, bringing Ricky's sound to an even wider audience.

He was quick to follow “Cut Dem Off” with another big single, “Jolly My Baby.” The independent video for this romantic hit was filmed on-location in Brooklyn, where hundreds of Blaze supporters participated. Ricky Blaze understands the streets - and the studio. Tastmaker magazine The Fader was quick to profile Ricky Blaze, hearing in his futuristic music the sound of a generation: “The strings, synth washes and vocoder create a palette of digital timbres that does to songs what a black light does to a club full of gyrating kids: gives everything a crystalline clarity, making it all brilliantly sharp-edged but far away in a manner that's almost sad, like the sound of teenage desire and teenage alienation at once.”

Inspired by the singles' runaway success, Ricky kept grinding: consolidating his street team, taking on new artists to develop, and pushing his own songwriting. With interest from major labels, and support by aboveground media like Hot97, his reach widens each month. From the streets of Brooklyn to fans in Tokyo, UK, and Africa (where dancing crews have started posting their own dance moves on YouTube, with Ricky's tunes as the soundtrack!) Ricky Blaze has rocked parties from Texas to Florida. An incendiary live performer, he has shared the stage with T-Pain, Jadakiss, and more.

With the anthem “Cut Them Off”still in rotation and new songs like “Feel Free ft. Ron Browz, Red Cafe, and Nikki Minaji”, Ricky's Do-It-Yourself grind has brought a new era to the dancehall. The young vocalist, producer, and entrepreneur has got Brooklyn on lock and is poised to take on the world.