About Us


Messianic Jewish dream radio. . . 

What happens when a Rabbi who used to work in a LA recording studio scene joins up with an on air personality when 20 years of radio experience?  Sounds of Shalom happens!  Broadcasting from beautiful downtown Utica New York, Sounds of Shalom is a pioneering internet radio station that has been on the air for over six years.  Bringing the best of international messianic and contemporary music across the globe.  We are playing music that has been recorded in Israel, Cyprus, Canada, Europe, United States and many other places.  

DJ's Bios

Doctor DJ

Dr. DJ Dave - is an upstate NY home-boy who graduated from Syracuse University. He has been an electrician, insurance underwriter, radio station on-air personality and hosted a call-in talk radio program. He has been the station manager of Sounds of Shalom since its inception, and can be caught twice a week on-air. When not on air, Dave teaches extension classes for Portland Bible School and is a Chaplin at a local nursing home facility. He has just finished up his doctoral studies in theology, so as to enhance his bible school question of the day which many of you have won! If you get the idea that Dr. DJ Dave is the Messianic Jewish radio version of the Energizer bunny, you are right!


 

Rabbi Steve

Steve is the Messianic Rabbi of Congregation Beit Shalom, in Utica, NY. He earned a Masters of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary a long time ago and has been leading messianic congregations in Upstate New York ever since. In addition to being a Messianic Rabbi, father of five children and husband to Deborah (accomplished biblical fiction novelist, to sample her work go to: www.greatbiblefiction.com), Steve is also a worship leader, bass player, consummate songwriter, sound engineer, and record producer. He is a conference speaker for Camps Farthest Out, an international affiliation of non-denominational, spiritual family camps (www.acfona.org).

During his college years, he was the technical director for a college radio station broadcasting on the left side of the FM dial into the western Pennsylvania mountains. This seemingly random experience provided the background to build Sounds of Shalom.

Out of college, he moved to the West Coast to seek his fortune working in Los Angeles as a recording engineer. Music and recording have always been a strong love of his. Though a trumpet player in his youth, he took up bass guitar at age thirty, joined the congregational worship team and started singing lead vocals! If Dylan, Springsteen, and Cockburn can sing, Steve figured there might be space for him to vocalize as well! Steve has most recently completed recording his own original cd, Sons of the Prophets.

Sounds of Shalom

Sounds of Shalom was birthed out of the urban renovation of an old downtown building in upstate NY. On break from dealing with 70,000 lbs of garbage being cleared out of this building, in the spring of 2005 DJ Dave told the rabbi, “What I’d love to do is talk to Jewish people about Yeshua.” The rabbi smiled, and said, “We can do that!” DJ Dave was incredulous. The cost of radio station gear, a radio transmitter, land for a transmitter site, cost of a tower, the arduous FCC licensing process and so much more was beyond what seemed possible for a small ministry. 

Before that conversation, the rabbi had been following the technological development of the internet. It was too small a thing to broadcast locally. The world was going to get Messianic Jewish internet radio! In that same downtown building, a suite of studios was built to house the future internet radio station. Prayer was raised up for this. Research was done about the best way to launch. Starting in June 2006, Sounds of Shalom went live and has been broadcasting continuously ever since. We are glad you are here!