Annette John-Hall: Disc jockey, singer, and a whole lot else

You could call Serena Sol Brown - singer, musician, and radio personality - a triple threat, as her friends like to say.

But that would be leaving out a lot. Let's see. She also writes songs. And produces and promotes artists. And did I mention deejaying and acting?

What are we up to now? Octuple threat?

Suffice it to say that Serena Sol's artistic journey has taken her in and out of so many facets of the music industry that that she probably could run a label herself.

Instead, the 37-year-old Germantown native is doing what she considers the next best thing - serving as an ambassador for underground and independent artists as host of her Philadelphia Internet radio program, the Serena Sol Brown Show (www.serenasolbrown.com).

"Jazzy, sexy Sol" may be the program's motto, but truth is, you never know what you'll hear on the show, webcast from 3 to 5 p.m. every Wednesday.

The only guarantee is that indie artists will be featured. Singers such as SoulGreg, a blue-eyed soul belter from Slovenia, of all places. Or the sublime Bridgette Bryant, a veteran backup-singing diva whom Serena Sol cornered at the West Oak Lane Jazz Festival over the summer. Or South Jersey's own Don Ward, probably the most famous contemporary gospel singer you've never heard of. Ward's group, Lift Jesus Name, is on the Grammy nomination list this year.

"I try to represent the underdogs," says Serena Sol, whose delightful effervescence makes you understand how she appreciates all of her life's experiences, good and bad.

See, Serena Sol intimately understands how artists struggle with no financial backing but diligently work "to get their music out there and get it heard," she says.

How?

"It all goes back to my own struggles."

From the time her grandfather introduced her to the piano at age 5, Kim Serena Sharpe always knew music would be her passion - despite her parents' insistence that education would be her pursuit.

But at Howard University, and later, after transferring to Ohio State - when an ill-fated marriage resulted in divorce - anything related to music became Serena Sol's primary pursuit.

She pitched songs and produced and promoted talent. She hosted concerts and deejayed. She sang backup and worked hole-in-the-wall clubs as a solo act. She even toured as a production assistant with the likes of Destiny's Child and Matchbox Twenty - all while raising three children.

But nothing stuck. In 2001, she moved back home. She figured if she was ever going to make it in music, it would be in Philly.

In 2006, an industry acquaintance suggested she do an Internet radio show. The thought intrigued her, but to compete with her commercial counterparts, she'd have to brand herself.

She dropped her first name in favor of her middle. She borrowed "Sol" from a cousin. "Brown" gave the moniker a perfect flow.

"The name to me felt like I had arrived," Serena Sol Brown says. "It meant everything I stood for."

After four years, Serena Sol still has high expectations for the show that bears her name.

"I look for artists to up the quality of the show," she says. "If I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it right, drawing on all my experience."

Although she thought going the Internet route would be a "slow train," it's been anything but.

The show live-streams globally, and grateful artists return Serena Sol's love by linking her show on their websites and Facebook pages and tweeting shout-outs on Twitter to their fans.

  What is apparent is that, as much as she's done, Serena Sol is just getting started.

"I'm really thinking about a way to go beyond a Web presence," she says. "If I had an indie award show. . .."

Just a little something else to add to the resumé.