R.I.P.: Don 'Don Juan' Banks, Longtime Philly Personality

Don Banks

Donald Antonio Banks, a gospel and R&B disc jockey best known by his radio name “Don Juan,” died on Wednesday, July 31, 2019.

He was 62, according to The Philadelphia Tribune.

Banks was an icon of the airwaves in Philadelphia for decades on WUSL-Power 99FM, where he was an on-air personality and production director until 2009.

Banks was a “quiet spirit” who was generous and mentored interns and new talent at the station, said Loraine Ballard Morrill, the director of news and community affairs for iHeart Media Philadelphia, which owns POWER 99FM.

“He truly really exemplified the best in broadcasting in terms of his professionalism and his generosity and his support of young artists and people who were just coming up in the field of gospel music,” said Morrill, who worked with Banks since she started at the station in the early 1980s.

Dave Allan, former program director and general manager at POWER 99 FM, said Banks never turned down a request to fill in for someone and he became synonymous with the station.

“He was always the go-to guy, the vacation guy and, clearly, one of the most popular disc jockeys that was ever on the radio station,” Allan said. “He was on seemingly all the time.”

Banks later launched his Sunday Morning Inspirations program in 1997, originally known as Sunday Morning Slow Jams.

At that time, few hip hop stations in the country had gospel music programs, but the show’s ratings were soon “off the charts,” said Colby “Colb” Tyner, a former host at POWER 99-FM and a colleague of Banks’ for 16 years.

“We had never seen ratings like that for a show and that’s when he really carved out an identity for himself by being sort of like the inspiration guy at the station,” said Tyner, the vice president of programming at Radio One.