YolanDa Brown

For some, world-wide touring and critically acclaimed albums would be satisfaction enough. Not for YolanDa Brown. She wears many hats including musician, broadcaster, author, philanthropist and wears them well, with passion and vigour.

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YolanDa is a double MOBO Award winning artist and has collaborated with artists such as Dave Stewart from Eurythmics, Snarky Puppy’s Bill Laurance, Kelly Jones from Stereophonics and Rick Astley. She is currently composing music for the iconic Sesame Street, an animated series called Bea’s Block on Sky Kids, as well as the Netflix Series, CocoMelon Lane. She was awarded an OBE for services to music, music education and broadcasting in the 2023 New Year Honours List by his Majesty the King. In July 2022, YolanDa was appointed Chair of BPI - the representative voice for record labels in the UK. BPI organises The BRIT Awards, The Mercury Prize and co-owns The Official Charts. The Lord Lieutenant of greater London appointed YolanDa as a Deputy Lieutenant in October 2022.

She is a broadcaster working across TV and Radio, including her eponymous series for CBeebies, YolanDa’s Band Jam, which won the RTSNW award as Best Children’s Programme. For the BBC Proms she hosted the Ella and Dizzy Centenary, as well as last night of the Proms, Gospel Choir of the Year for BBC One and BBC Young Jazz Musician of the year. Host of the London Philharmonic Orchestra podcast, Offstage, YolanDa presents a series talking to a range of musicians within the LPO about their experiences as orchestral musicians.

Over on the airways, she hosts YolanDa Brown on Saturday on Jazz FM, presents the best of classical music on Scala Radio on Sundays, BBC Radio 4’s Loose Ends and can be heard regularly across BBC Radio 2 and Magic FM.

You may have also spotted her flexing her general knowledge muscles on such shows as Bridge of Lies with Ross Kemp, University Challenge, The Hit List, House of Games, Celebrity Mastermind, Pointless Celebrities which she won, Celebrity Eggheads and Gareth Malone’s, All Star Music Quiz. She even got to indulge her other passion of classic cars on Celebrity Antiques Road Trip, scouring the country for hidden treasures and she was recently a sitter on Portrait Artist of the Year on Sky Arts.

An entrepreneur too, YolanDa launched the London Saxophone Festival in 2018, currently in its third edition, and is about to launch her own music venue and restaurant, Soul Mama.

A true renaissance woman, continually scaling new heights in her diverse endeavours.