User:Yasinelashrafi/sandbox

= Yasin El Ashrafi = Yasin El Ashrafi born 02 February 1980 in Leicester is the founder of HQ Recording, HQ Can and HQ familia. Yasin was featured on The Sunday Times Alternative Rich List 2018 for his voluntary and community work within music and education. His record label HQ Familia has signed Two artists, Charlie Georgio and Phidizz and manages 7 other artists from Leicester and the Midlands.

Yasin has been noted for his work in the community, where, through HQ he has helped young people start businesses or become self employed within the music industry leading him to become the inaugural Prince’s trust mentor of the year.

Early life
He was born in Leicester Royal Infirmary hospital and brought up in the St Andrews estate, Leicester until he was 8 years old. In 1988 he moved to New Parks, where he lived with his mum and five younger sisters.

He left New Parks Community College at fifteen-years-old and after was expelled from Longslade School in Leicester leaving with no GCSES.

His interest in music led him to continue with education in an alternative setting, he completed workshops and a course in 1995 at Soft touch studios in Leicester where he got into DJing, and music production. As a raver in during the 1990’s he was heavily into music, frequenting free parties and nights such as Ravers die hard, Sanctuary, Helter Skelter and Dance Planet.

Yasin battled drug addiction and alcohol abuse from 1996 -2006. He overcome his addictions at age 26 when his first son Kai El Ashrafi was born. He did this without a rehabilitation programme and just with the help from his local GP and his own willpower.

Yasin’s son Kai was born with cerebal pausy and Yasin struggled to maintain a job due to his 24 hour care needs. This prompted him to try to start his own business, he said, to have a more flexible career that allowed him to choose his own hours. Now clean from drugs and determined, he reconnected with his friends within the music industry which he says chose music at the time he had chosen drugs. Using his desire to help others, passion for music and ability to hustle he began his first business LCMP.

“I’ve got a good mind for business, I was always a hustler, even at school I was selling fags, sweets and clothes, now I wanted to do something positive with that natural skill of mine.”

Career 2010- present
Yasin is currently CEO at HQ recording studio, HQ Can and Record label HQ Familia. He founded HQ Recording in 2010, HQ recording is a music recording studio located at Leicester’s old music Mecca and home to formation records 5HQ. He described getting the keys to the building a “dream come true.”

Yasin began his first project LCMP ( Leicester Community music Project) in 2009 with his friends and networks he had made during his time at Soft Touch. The company was inspired by Soft touch which was only for people aged up to 19-years-old. LCMP was just for ages over 18…. And involved a mixture of projects, workshops and outreach work funded by Leicester city council, The National Lottery Community Fund, Leicestershire and Rutland Community Foundation and was then helped to open their first premisis (HQ) by CASE Co Operative

HQ Recording Studio
HQ Recording is a commercial business, selling studio time artist development packages, production, lessons 121. The music types coming out of the studio are Urban Genres such as drill, grime, rap, hiphop. Pop music, RNB, dance and electronic.

The studio has recently been granted a funding social investment loan of £42000 loan and 8000 grant from the Key Fund. The money has been used to create a second studio, and upgrade the main studio into a state of the art, industry standard music hu making HQ the number one studio in Leicester.

HQ CAN
Yasin has devised many projects that have allowed young people and unemployed adults to access services, mentoring and studio time for free. HQ CAN also connected with Big Lottery Funded project Talent Match that provided services through HQ recording to nurture a variety of talents such as radio broadcasting, singing, rapping, production and DJing with an aim to build confidence in those that are unemployed.

HQ Familia
The record label was established in 2017 with Yasin saying that he saw so much talent coming out of his studio and from the city that he wanted to give people a chance. “There's a lot of talent but it's not really being heard so we have a lot of stuff just on the computer and on the SoundCloud that I thought was just too good to not be heard so we ended up setting up the label so that we could help people get their music out there.”

The label has received interest from a Sony A&R. Yasin and artists assigned to HQ Familia are frequently featured on BBC radio Introducing eventually leading to a collaborative BBC Introducing and HQ Familia event. The label won Ditto Music “Record label of the month” in January, 2018 and has also been on 1Xtra’s DJ Target show.

Artists signed to the label are Charlie Georgio, Phidizz. Other artists involed and under management are Harry Georgio, Alice Kübe, Maniscooler, Ffion Rebecca, Scrivs & Tayo B

Mentorship
Yasin won Prince’s trust mentor award in 2018. He began giving free studio space for 18 – 24 year olds who have been unemployed for over a year, supporting them to start a new chapter in their lives. Since then he has mentored over 80 young people, including those struggling with mental illness and ex-offenders. Many of Yasin’s mentees have started businesses or become self employed as a result of his guidance, and he has overseen eight young people securing record deals.- (reference)

Yasin recently has started a relatable mentor programme targeting youth violence, where mentees later become mentors to help others that have come from similar background to stay away from violence an develop themselves as artists or creatives from a relatable and genuine position.

Media Appearances
Yasin has been featured on Good Morning Britain, ITV news, BBC news, Radio East Midlands, late night with Graham Torrington, BBC Introducing, local stations and The Leicester Mercury for his hard work in the community and with the artists on his label for their success as musicians.

In a personal letter to Yasin, former Prime Minister Theresa May said:

“By sharing your knowledge of the music industry and providing free studio space, you are helping young people to realise their creative potential. You should be enormously proud of working with The Prince’s Trust to deliver inspirational mentoring which is helping so many young people in need of support to get back on their feet.”

Awards
Yasin won Prince’s trust mentor of the year 2018, for his work on Big Lottery funded project. He was also featured on the Sunday Times Alternative rich list 2018. He received a Prime Ministers Points Of Light Award and also was named the Leicester Mercury Young Business Executive Of The Year

Present Life
Yasin lives in Kibworth, with his partner Sallyanne Kirk and his son Lion 3. His Son Kai is now 13 and his second child Ava is 7, the mother of his first two children and Yasin have split up, he sees his children every weekend. Yasin’ s life revolves around his kids and work which he says is entwined.