DK Music Business Academy

Damian Keyes is an award-winning Music Industry Educator, Entrepreneur, Social Media Specialist and Bass Player. His career highlights include:

• Founding the world’s largest set of music colleges (BIMM), valued in excess of $200M.
• Over 14M+ views on YouTube, educating musicians on how to release music in the modern world.
• Writing two Amazon Best Selling Books, The Rule Breakers Guide to Social Media and Stop Selling Music.

Jon Shone is a keyboard player, songwriter, arranger, and musical director with over 10 years of experience at the top level of the music industry.

• Played over 150+ stadiums as an MD with One Direction.
• Worked as an MD for a long line of acts, including Bryan Adams, Michael Buble and Olly Murs.
• Specializes in programming audio for large venues and touring.

Chris Leonard is a hit songwriter who has co-written with artists including Ed Sheeran, Paulo Nutini and James Bay.

• Chris co-wrote several Ed Sheeran hits including Lego House and Give Me Love.
• He was the guitarist on Thinking out Loud which is the 16th most streamed song in existence on Spotify and was once the fastest song to reach 500M streams.
• Other credits include One Direction, Shawn Mendes and Shania Twain.

Ella is a former TV Producer who is now a Co-Founder of DK Music Business Academy.

• Ella previously worked on shows like The X Factor, Strictly Come Dancing and Come Dine With Me in the UK.
• Ella has scaled DK Music Business Academy to 73 countries with over 10,000 students.
• She specialises in content creation, having previously filmed and edited for broadcast.

Jason Bavanandan is a songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist.

• Jason has over a decade’s experience working with major label artists, such as Calvin Harris, Noel Gallagher and Diana Ross.
• Jason was mentored by Paul Epworth (Adele, Florence and the Machine), Danton Supple (Coldplay) and Ben Hiller (U2, Blur).
• He is signed to Sony/ATV, the world’s largest publishing company.

Ben McKelvey is a singer songwriter with 10 years of experience of touring and recording.

• He has toured as an independent artist with the likes of Scouting For Girls, Mike + The Mechanics and Wet Wet Wet.
• He’s placed across UK arenas, renowned venues like The Royal Albert Hall as well as across Europe and the US.
• He has self released over 50 solo tracks and is now moving into management and consulting for independent artists as well as remaining an active recording and touring artist.