Meet the 71-year-old DJ who encourages others to 'dance to your own music'
Brian Phoenix went viral after a wedding guest shared a video of him at work.
At 71, Brian Phoenix is not slowing down.
The longtime DJ has been spinning tracks for the last four decades, but this month, he went viral on TikTok after Miranda Dolph shared a video clip of him working at her friends Howie and Jenn Hall's Oct. 7 wedding in Saco, Maine.
In the accompanying caption, Dolph wrote, "Went to a wedding and they had the cutest old DJ who used his CD collection for all the music 🥺." Her TikTok has since been viewed over 9 million times in just over two weeks and Phoenix said he is amazed at how people have seen and responded to the 22-second clip.
"It's not like I was saving a baby from a burning building or 'Oh my God, look at that. The roof was caving in and he lifted it back up.' I'm just standing there. So, I find that amazing," Phoenix told "Good Morning America."
Dolph told "GMA" she didn't think too much about Phoenix's presence at the wedding initially but then a friend pointed out that he was selecting songs from an impressive collection of CDs.
"When I looked over, I could see him digging through the CD collection and lining up the next songs and that's what really struck me, and I think struck others, was just, you know, from all the weddings I've been at, I usually just see people using playlists and computers and not necessarily digging through all the CDs," Dolph said.
"Watching Brian DJ, I thought it was inspiring for him to be doing what he loves to do," she added.
Following the outsized reaction to her initial TikTok video of Phoenix, Dolph said she reached out to him and he shared another video message, which Dolph subsequently shared in a follow-up TikTok post.
"When I spoke with him after the video took off, it was very clear to me how passionate he is about DJing, and that that's why he does it -- and to be honest, his message just made me happy, to know that that's what he's doing," she said.
In the second video, Phoenix shared the same powerful message he reiterated for "GMA" readers, encouraging everyone, especially his fellow septuagenarians to "dance to your own music."
"Don't let society tell you, 'Oh, you're old. You gotta go to the back of the bus. You're not. But you dance to your own music. You do it for as long as you want," Phoenix said.
"If you're older and you still like what you're doing and you're good at it, you can still do it," he added.
Phoenix said he knew from a young age that he wanted to be on the radio and DJ.
"It's all I ever wanted to do -- it's my entire dream, my entire life," he said.
In the sixth grade, he said he even had friends call his home phone to request a song, which he would then happily play for them over the receiver.
These days, he primarily relies on his computer and massive CD collection, and plays at weddings about once a week.
"I play CDs at dance time because it gives me more control of how the music comes in, how it starts out," Phoenix explained.
After so long, he also said he has mastered which tracks get people moving on the dance floor, hits like Whitney Houston's "I Want to Dance With Somebody," Usher's "Yeah!" and Dua Lipa's "Levitating."
He added that the Halls' Oct. 7 wedding was "so much fun."
At the end of the day, Phoenix said his main takeaway for others is to chase your dreams and never settle.
"Whatever your dream is, don't let anybody touch and play with it, influence you, telling you you can't do it. Go out there and do it," Phoenix said, adding that persistence is a major ingredient to success.
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