Brian Hurst

A Londoner born and bred, Brian continues to baffle both loved ones and friends alike with his colourful and unique use of the English language. His enthusiasm for life is only matched with his passion for music which has reverberated around the rooms in his house for over thirty years.

With the obligatory path of mobile DJ followed, he has DJ’d in various clubs through his teenage years and then moving from stage to studio and into the heddy days of London’s pirate radio scene with the iconic Horizon Radio and its successor, and now pan-European based, Solar Radio.

In 2000 Brian created www.soul24-7.com which although suffered many growing pains, was groundbreaking in the fact that it led the way for soul music onto the new medium of the internet. He believes there couldn’t be a better time to fine tune his original concept and present a different and more accessible approach to the music of so many great artists.

Brian couldn’t really tell you his favourite band, singer or style of music but if you think along the lines of Stevie, Donny, Marvin, Ledisi, The Jones Girls, Tommy Sims or Rahsaan Patterson, you’ll be on the right track. His greatest musical influences though came from his father and to this day, the legends that are Tony Monson and Peter Young.

Jamal Ahmad

Jamal is a native of Atlanta, Georgia and through the years has moved from radio intern to “One of the most influential figures in the international soul music scene” – Tavis Smiley.

For the past 15 years, his show, The S.O.U.L. of Jazz, has served as a launching pad for countless local, national and international artists and can be heard daily on Atlanta’s WCLK 91.9 FM.

He was co-founder and head of A&R for the Groovement/Earthseed record label and spearheaded the early recordings of India.Arie, Anthony David and Donnie. He also worked as an on-air announcer for the nationally syndicated radio program, Truth FM, which was sponsored by the Truth.com and also alongside Brian Hurst in the early days of www.soul24-7.com; all before the age of 25.

Awarded the Cultural Warrior Award, by the National Black Arts Festival, and inducted into Who’s Who in Black Atlanta, he is a two time winner of the Best Radio DJ award by Creative Loafing and was most recently awarded the Best Drive time DJ by the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Cha-Cha- Jones

Native Atlantan Cha-Cha Jones is a music connoisseur, community figure, actress, voice-over performer and DJ. As a radio show host for 8 years, she loves the mellow and soulful music of artists like Jill Scott, India Arie, Anthony Hamilton, Erykah Badu, Anthony David and Musiq.

Ms. Cha, as she is affectionately known, began volunteering at WRFG Atlanta and landed a spot as co-host of The World Party. As an entering student at Georgia State University, she became a part of The Weekend Wrekkin’ Crew (WWC) of WRAS Atlanta and soon became the hostess and #1 promoter of Urban Flava: Atlanta’s Soul & Acid Jazz.

Following this she became a full-time reading specialist & grad student, audio engineering intern, and radio hostess on WRAS Atlanta and a short while later took an offer of a part-time position with Hot 107.9, WHTA Atlanta. Exposure to the commercial side of the industry led to an opportunity to work with the TRUTH campaign as a travelling DJ on TRUTH FM. Later she would become Marketing Manager for GTM (Guerilla Tactics Marketing) and additionally, under the helm of Rico Wade & The Dungeon Family, go on to audio engineer records for Ludacris, Sleepy Brown, Brandy, and Earth, Wind, & Fire.

Over the years, Cha-Cha has opened for the likes of Kanye West, Kelis, Dwele, India, Bilal and Jill Scott, and has played the Funkjazz Kafe in Atlanta and the Jazz Café in London.

As Ms. Cha says “At www.soulandjazz.com, I’ll get to play music that doesn’t get the mainstream push along with the radio jams. I love to DJ for people who love music.” Amen to that.

Stephen Mitchell

Stephen graduated with a degree in Business Administration from University of Central Florida, where he also served as publisher of the student newspaper. His love of music guided his early career as he developed several major label rock bands before assisting the management of the publishing catalogue and recording studios of world-renowned musician and songwriter Tommy Sims: Eric Clapton’s Change The World and Tommy’s solo album Peace And Love [One of the greatest albums of the last 25 years – BH].

Following a stint in music publishing where he signed Grammy-winning producer/songwriter Andrew Ramsey (India.Arie, Shannon Sanders, Jonny Lang, Robert Randolph) and Nathan & Caleb Followill (Grammy-winning rock band Kings of Leon), Stephen served as A&R consultant to then CEO Jason Flom at Atlantic Records.

Stephen currently resides in New York and has been focusing on developing his acting and screenwriting skills. He recently produced & directed Kings of Leon’s online video series Home Movies for the launch of the band’s album Only By the Night and has been filming their breakout year around the globe. Stephen admits to knowing just a little about soul music and very little about jazz, but he looks forward to broadening his base of musical knowledge, like he promised Ahmet Ertegun he would do, through the development of www.soulandjazz.com.