DJ Casper

Willie Perry Jr. (born May 31, 1971), best known as DJ Casper, is an American songwriter and DJ.[1] Perry Jr. was raised in Englewood, Chicago, and is known as Casper because he almost always wears white clothing on stage. He is also known as Mr. C The Slide Man.[2]

Perry's first hit record, "Casper Slide Pt. 1" — also known as "Cha Cha Slide" — was created by Perry for his nephew, who worked as a personal trainer at a Bally Total Fitness in 1998. After the song grew in popularity as an aerobic exercise at fitness clubs and PE in schools, Casper created a second song in 2000, titled "Casper Slide Pt. 2", which was picked up by Elroy Smith at Chicago's radio station, WGCI-FM.

The song became a hit in Chicago in 2004, when the city's M.O.B. Records record label became involved as well, helping Perry create a whole compilation album with other Chicago-based artists to promote the dance. "Cha Cha Slide" was later picked up by Universal Records. In January 2016, Perry Jr. was diagnosed with kidney cancer and neuroendocrine cancer.[3][4] After unsuccessful surgery the same month, he began chemotherapy.[4] In an interview in July 2018, he stated he was in remission.[5] In 2019, Perry stated that he beat his liver and kidney cancers and said he is a changed man, stating "that was God's way of just slowing me down just a little bit."[6]

Perry makes an appearance as a DJ in a Season 6 episode of Orange Is the New Black, in Crazy Eyes' hallucination of the prisoners and guards line dancing to the Cha Cha Slide.[7]