Joseph Simmons, Biography, Age, Family, Wife, Children, Career, Net worth and Songs

Joseph Simmons Biography

Joseph Simmons is a musician, rapper and actor who is best known by the stage names Run, Rev. Run or DJ Run. Simmons is also one of the founding members of Run–D.M.C, an influential hip hop group. He is also a practicing minister, known as Reverend Run. He has been a musician since 1981 and was born in Hollis, Queens, New York.

Joseph Simmons Age

Simmons was born on 14 November 1964 in Hollis, New York City, New York, United States. He is 53 years old as of 2017.

Joseph Simmons Family

Simmons is the youngest brother of artist Daniel Simmons, Jr. and Def Jam Records co-founder Russell Simmons.  His brother , Russell Simmons of   hip-hop  mogul, has five children. He was a founding member of pioneering rap group Run-DMC.  He joined the hip hop scene as a DJ for Kurtis Blow. Simmons assumed the alias “Son of Kurtis Blow”, but later changed it to “Run”.

Simmons  became a reverend at Zoe Ministries, a controversial church that solicits monetary pledges for spiritual enlightenment.  Later he changed his name to “Rev Run”.

Joseph Simmons Wife

Joseph Simmons Valerie Vaughn

Simmons has been married twice: first in 1983 to Valerie Vaughn. Their marriage resulted into the birth of their three children: Vanessa Simmons, a TV host and actress, Angela Simmons and Joseph Simmons Jr..

Simmons got married a second time to Justine Jones (now Justine Simmons) on June 25, 1994. They have had four kids together: Daniel “Diggy” Dwayne Simmons III ( better known as Diggy Simmons), Russell “Russy” Simmons II, Victoria Anne Simmons and Miley Justine Simmons who is adopted. Their daughter Victoria Anne died on the same day she was born (September 26, 2006).

Joseph Simmons Kids | Joseph Simmons Children

Simmons had three children with his first wife Valerie Vaughn. They are Vanessa Simmons, Angela Simmons and Joseph “JoJo” Ward Simons Jr.. From his second marriage to wife Justine Jones, he got three more children: Daniel “Diggy” Simmons III, Russell “Russy” Simmons II and Victoria Anne Simmons.

Joseph Simmons and Victoria Anne Simmons

His daughter Victoria was born through cesarean. She was four pounds, five ounces. She died shortly after being born on September 26, 2006 due to omphalocele. This is a birth defect that caused her organs to grow outside her body. Victoria’s death was documented after Simmons allowed MTV camera crews of Run’s House to document baby Victoria’s death, telling people that “God in my mind, gave us something to go through in front of America, so we documented it on camera not so much to show you sadness, but to show you how we as ministers, would handle this tragedy.

His other kids with Justine found out about their sister on camera. Daniel was eager to see his mommy and the first words they said to them were “The baby didn’t make it.” They later decided to adopt a baby girl, Miley Justine Simmons.

Joseph Simmons Career

Simmons started using the stage name of “Rev. Run” after he was ordained as a Pentecostal minister by E. Bernard Jordan who is Simmons’s spiritual mentor. He was also named “Protege of the Year Award” by Jordan in 2004. That same day, symbolic of his “Prosperity Ministry”, there was a “Rolls Royce parade outside the Plaza Hotel in New York City “featuring Jordan’s Phantom Rolls Royce. The new $325,000 Phantom had been a gift from Reverend Run or Simmons as a “thank you” for Jordan’s mentoring support

Simmons first work as Rev. Run was a feature in the single “Song 4 Lovers” by UK pop band Liberty X in September 2005. Bill Schacht was the Video director of the music for that song which was directed for Aestheticom and reached broadcast airplay chart positions of No. 2 Box UK and No. 4 MTV UK with heavy rotation on 5 other music channels in the UK.

The song was followed by his first solo album, Distortion. Simmons’s album first single from the album, “Mind on the Road”, is featured in the EA Sports’s Madden NFL 06 video game. This song uses samples from the song “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll”, in the tradition of Run–D.M.C.’s 1980s hits which use samples like Aerosmith’s hit “Walk This Way”.

In 2002, Simmons was presented on a special “Rap Stars” edition of The Weakest Link, and was the third one voted off. Simmons known as Rev Run appeared on the MTV series Run’s House, a reality show revolving around his everyday life with his family, from 2005-2009.

In 2007, together with his son Diggy Simmons they appeared on My Super Sweet 16 while attending a 16th birthday party for Diddy’s son, Quincy. Diddy is also the producer of Run’s House. On September 8, 2007, Simmons was honored as a BMI Icon at the annual BMI Urban Awards.

Simmons and his wife Justine teamed up with Kool-Aid and a non-profit organization called KaBOOM! in 2008 to help build playgrounds in under-served communities. With Kool-Aid, the couple helped to build twenty four playgrounds over the course of 2008 and hope to raise awareness for the need for safe play spaces.

On August 5, 2008, this is when Gotham Press published Simmons’ book known as Take Back Your Family Which talked about A Challenge to America’s Parents, co-authored by his wife, Justine Simmons, and Chrisifer Morrow.

On the weekend of September 17 and 18 of 2011, Simmons made a special guest appearance at Bay Area Fellowship with Pastor Bil Cornelius in Corpus Christi, Texas Bay Area Fellowship Church.

He was a special guest of Fellowship Church based out of Grapevine, Texas in October 2011. Simmons has also made two other cable series, both of which premiered in 2014 known as Rev Run’s Renovation which runs on both the DIY Network and HGTV, and Rev Run’s Sunday Suppers for Cooking Channel.

Joseph Simmons House

The Simmons family lives in in Saddle River, New Jersey. It is here that the Run’s House, an American reality television series that the family life of former Run–D.M.C. rapper and hip-hop music pioneer Joseph Simmons was filmed. It debuted on October 13, 2005 and ran through to July 13, 2009. It’s theme song and name are from the Run-D.M.C. album Tougher Than Leather. It was also filmed at the Simmons offices in Manhattan, New York; and the apartment shared by Simmons’ daughters, Vanessa and Angela, in Los Angeles, California.

Joseph Simmons Net Worth

Rev Run has an estimated net worth of $70 million dollars.

Rev Run – Mind On The Road

Joseph Simmons Songs

Joseph Simmons All about the Washington’s Video