Michael Brun (born May 19, 1992) is a Haitian DJ, record producer and medical student, known for blending EDM genres such as progressive house with native Haitian styles such as kompa and rara. He released one of his first singles on Hardwell’s Revealed Recordings in 2011. He later went on to work with Dirty South, and Brun released his debut Gravity EP in 2013. The EP
reached No. 2 on the Beatport charts, directly underneath Avicii. In 2015, he released See You Soon which received over 1.3 million streams on Spotify in its first seven weeks, as well as a collaboration with Roy English entitled Tongue Tied July. Michael is also an ambassador for Paul Haggis’ Artist for Peace and Justice, a nonprofit that supports programs in education, healthcare and dignity through the arts. He frequently travels to Haiti where he mentors children in their school, The Audio Institute.
He founded the record label Kid Coconut in 2014, which beyond Brun’s solo releases will “seek to showcase and develop Haitian artists who would otherwise lack access to such exposure.”
Currently based in New York, Brun tours frequently, performing at festivals such as Coachella. In 2014 he became the first Haitian to play at Ultra Music Festival, and also in 2014 he was nominated for World’s Best EDM Artist at the World Music Awards.
Michael Brun was born in 1992 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to a Haitian father and Guyanese mother and also has Chinese ancestry. Growing up in Port-auPrince, he was exposed to music at an early age, recollecting that “I grew up listening to Caribbean Sextet and Tabou Combo. My dad was in a band called Skandal in the ’90s. I’m influenced by everything that comes from home.
While still young he also began learning violin and guitar. When he was in his teens, he began using Virtual DJ to make what he called “terrible mashups.” In 2008, at age sixteen he began DJing as a hobby. He also had an early interest in being a doctor, and in his teens would
volunteer at local hospitals.
He attended Culver Military Academy in Indiana through a scholarship program, stating in 2014 that “The stuff I learned there about discipline was so important to the way
I work now. The schedule was so regimented. I have really kept that whole mentality up until now.” He then earned a full scholarship to attend Davidson College in North Carolina, where he was a member of the Kappa Alpha Order, Sigma chapter. As a freshman, he began studying towards pre-med as a major, while also working on his music production.
