The latest One on 1 profile takes his name from one of history's greatest composers, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He's a musician like Mozart, but marches to a different kind of beat. NY1's Budd Mishkin has his story.

You know Diddy, you know LL Cool J. You know J. Lo. and you probably know Jay Z. But do you know Amadeus?

"I'm comfortable with where I am and the recognition that I get for what I do," Amadeus said. "I'm not an artist. I don't have aspirations to be an artist."

Amadeus, who grew up in the South Bronx, is a musician with a regular gig as a drummer at the nightclub "Drai's" in Las Vegas. But he's made his name as a producer, working with some of the biggest names in rap and hip hop, pop, and R and B, like Chris Brown, Nicky Minaj, and Fabolous.

With the artist Trey Songz, he has an even bigger role as a musical director, helping to shape his sound.

Amadeus owns a production company, Platinum Boy Music, and has produced for more than 60 artists.

"I would only be hurting myself if I didn't push you to your limit," Amadeus said. "I want to leave here saying, 'Oh, this is the best record we were able to make together.'"

What entices some of the biggest names in the industry to work with Amadeus? There's his musical training, and ability to provide the artists with an original beat without sampling, which is taking a piece of one recording and using it on another.

"Me being a musician — understanding theory, and time signature, and sequencing, and all of that — gives me advantage in regards to producing, but I don't do it on my own," Amadeus said.

Songs are often recorded now with the artist and producer in different places, e-mailing ideas back and forth.

Amadeus prefers the old school style of being in the same studio, so that there is an honest collaboration between artist and producer.

"You gotta deal with people differently.  If I work with J. Lo. and we work this particular way, me working with Chris or Fabolous might be different," Amadeus explained. "I go into it knowing these are three completely different artists, and I'm just kind of going into it on a clean slate, and just feeling out the energy."

"I haven't worked with anyone that I've been intimidated by," the producer said. "I'm very confident of who I am and what I have to contribute musically."

Intimidated? A guy who grew up in the South Bronx at 169th and Washington Avenue in Claremont Village? Not likely.

"Between the gangs, between the drugs — just a negative aspect of life in any neighborhood," Amadeus recalled. "So I got timed to go to school. I got timed to get back from school.  I guess I was a sort of a target because of the type of school I attended, so I had to dress up, had to wear slacks, dress shirt, and tie.

"Growing up in a neighborhood like this, that's not what everybody else is wearing. Everybody else is wearing Jordans."

But Amadeus, born Antwan Thompson, fell in love with music during that childhood.

"Very strict household, and obviously it paid off," he reflected.

In fourth grade at the St. Augustine's School of the Arts, he was introduced to the drums, and he's never stopped playing them.

Wherever he turned, there was music, like every Sunday in church.

"That's how it started: in the church," Amadeus said. "And then I went from church to becoming a professional musician. And I was working on albums in high school — like real albums."

Amadeus was attending Cardinal Hayes High School when he experienced his first success.

Some beats he created at home found their way to the rapper Foxy Brown, and she put them in a song in the movie "Cradle 2 the Grave."

"It was an actual track I made in my living room," Amadeus said. "Credits roll at the end and there was my name, Amadeus, going across, and I turn to people and say, 'That's me.' They were like, 'Whatever, dude.'"

Amadeus frequently returns to his old neighborhood, not just to catch up with old friends and family.

Last summer, he created what he hopes will become an annual event, "Amadeus is Coming Home," similar to the program he brings to college campuses, his Music 101 Tour.

"I brought a lot of my industry friends here," Amadeus said in Claremont Village. "Musicians, and artists, and executives, and people came to the neighborhood, talking about the music business and teaching the students, and the kids, and the people in the neighborhood of what you need to do, how you need to do it, how I did it."

"A lot of friends that I grew up with are no longer here. A lot of friends I grew up with are locked up," Amadeus said. "So, I made it out. I made it out, and that's why I wanted to come back here and show whoever is still here that it's not about your environment. It's about your mind. It's about what’s in your heart."

He tries to create an environment and a sound in studio that will produce the best record. But there is one issue he says he's doesn't discuss: lyrics.

"When you come into the studio with me, it's judgment free," Amadeus explained. "You are free to say whatever you want to say and however you want to say it, and the audience and the fans have a decision to make: whether they support it or not."

Since he is not a lyricist, Amadeus doesn't have to answer directly to the criticisms occasionally lobbed at rap and hip hop, such as misogynistic lyrics.

Still, he makes choices about who gets to hear which songs he produces.

"Facebook has a lot of my family members, and my pastor, and my mom, and church members, and people I respect," Amadeus explained. "There's things I would post on Instagram that I wouldn't post on Facebook, out of respect to my elders."

You might be wondering: what's with the name?

He didn't really like his given name Antwan. In searching around for others, he took to the suggestion of Amadeus — gradually.

"Once I watched the movie in school, I learned we had a lot in common," Amadeus said. "He's nuts — absolutely nuts — he's a clown, he's a character, he loved women. I was like, 'Yes, Amadeus.'"

I wondered if Amadeus would want to switch places with some of the stars he's produced and be the headliner. He seems fine with his level of fame.

"The simple things of me saying, 'I'm hungry, I'm going to go get a sandwich from store or deli on corner right now where we're at,'" Amadeus said. "I can do that; Trey can't do that. Chris Brown can't do that, Justin Bieber can't do that."

Amadeus is 36. He has a son from a former marriage, and a schedule that rarely has him in one place for a long time.

But it's pretty clear he'll always be coming back to the place in the Bronx where it all started.

"I snuck a listen to hip hop every night. I would have a Walkman hidden under my pillow," Amadeus said. "And whenever I was supposed to be going to sleep and getting ready for the next day to go to school, I would take out those headphones, put them over my head, and just rock out and jam out. And here I am today."

Amadeus will tour with Trey Songz in May. They will perform at the PlayStation Theater on Broadway on May 19.