Joshua Russaw: Inside the Quiet Music Career of Faith Evans’ Son

Joshua Russaw, known professionally as DJ Jahad, is the son of Grammy-winning R&B singer Faith Evans and music executive Todd Russaw. Born on June 10, 1998, in Los Angeles, he grew up surrounded by music through his mother’s decades-long career and his father’s work in artist management. He’s the half-brother of C.J. Wallace, son of The Notorious B.I.G., and the two have collaborated musically as the duo CJ & Jahad. Beyond that project, Joshua has built his own identity as a DJ and producer, blending classic R&B and soul influences with contemporary hip-hop sounds, while also picking up modeling and brand work along the way. This post covers his family background, career timeline, and what’s publicly known about his net worth and personal life. 

Who Is Joshua Russaw?

Joshua Jahad Russaw was born on June 10, 1998, in Los Angeles, California. He’s the son of Faith Evans, the Grammy-winning R&B singer and songwriter, and Todd Russaw, a music industry executive and talent manager. His parents married in the late 1990s, and Joshua grew up as part of a large, musically connected blended family.

Faith Evans is one of the most respected voices in R&B history. She was the first woman signed to Sean Diddy Combs’ Bad Boy Entertainment and rose to prominence in the 1990s, both as a solo artist and through her marriage to The Notorious B.I.G. (Christopher Wallace), with whom she had her first son, Christopher C.J. Wallace Jr. After Biggie died in 1997, Faith later married Todd Russaw. Joshua was born the following year as part of that second marriage.

That makes Joshua the half-brother of C.J. Wallace, and by extension, someone who grew up adjacent to two of the most storied legacies in hip-hop and R&B, his stepfather’s late husband’s legendary rap career on one side, and his mother’s decades-long singing career on the other. He also has two other siblings: a brother named Ryder Evan Russaw and a sister, Chyna Tahjere Griffin.

Faith Evans and Todd Russaw divorced in 2011, after roughly 13 years of marriage. Faith went on to marry producer Stevie J in 2018, though that marriage ended a few years later. Through it all, family members have generally described the Russaw children as close, despite the complicated web of marriages and divorces that surrounded their upbringing.

Growing Up Around Music

It’s hard to overstate how immersive Joshua’s childhood must have been from a musical standpoint. His mother is one of the defining voices of 1990s R&B, known for hits and for her work during the Bad Boy Entertainment era. His father worked behind the scenes in production and artist management. By most accounts, Joshua spent much of his early life around recording studios, live shows, and the day-to-day business of the music industry, the kind of environment that either turns a kid off from the business entirely or pulls them straight into it.

For Joshua, it appears to have been the latter. Rather than pursuing a career in an unrelated field, he leaned into music, eventually working as a DJ, producer, and occasional performer. Several biography sites describe him as someone who chose a comparatively private, grounded approach to entering the industry rather than trying to capitalize quickly on his family name, building skills gradually rather than chasing an instant spotlight.

Music Career: DJ Jahad and the Duo CJ & Jahad

Joshua performs under the stage name DJ Jahad, using his middle name as his artistic identity, a way of carving out a name for himself that’s connected to, but distinct from, Russaw.

CJ & Jahad

The most notable public chapter of Joshua’s music career has been his collaboration with his half-brother, C.J. Wallace, under the name CJ & Jahad. The duo first drew media attention around 2017, when outlets reported that the two brothers were working on a debut project together, blending their shared upbringing around hip-hop and R&B into their own sound. Rather than trying to directly recreate their famous parents’ musical styles, the pair reportedly leaned toward a more personal, understated approach in their recordings.

Beyond the CJ & Jahad project, some accounts describe Joshua’s involvement with a broader collective or group sometimes referred to as Non-Fiction, where he worked alongside other up-and-coming artists to build production experience and refine his sound as DJ Jahad.

DJing and Production

Separate from the group project with his brother, Joshua has built a reputation as a working DJ, known for blending classic R&B and soul influences with more contemporary hip-hop, trap, and house elements. This kind of stylistic bridge, taking sounds his mother’s generation popularized and reworking them for younger audiences, fits naturally with his background. He’s reportedly performed at industry events and has, at various points, worked as a tour DJ connected to his mother’s live shows.

He’s also credited as a music producer, working on beats and tracks both for himself and in collaboration with others. His Instagram presence has, at times, highlighted this side of his work, studio clips, production snippets, and behind-the-scenes glimpses that position him as what one fan site described as a sound bender, someone shaping and reworking audio rather than simply performing it.

Modeling and Other Ventures

In addition to music, Joshua has done some fashion modeling work, and multiple sources describe him as fashion-forward, occasionally partnering with brands on social media. This isn’t unusual for someone with his level of public visibility, a recognizable last name and an active Instagram following naturally open doors in modeling and brand partnerships, even for someone who isn’t primarily pursuing that as a career.

Some more recent write-ups from 2026 have framed Joshua’s role somewhat more expansively, suggesting involvement in areas like music catalog and legacy management given the growing business of buying, selling, and preserving music rights tied to legacy artists. It’s worth noting that this kind of claim is far less consistently corroborated across sources than the more basic facts of his biography, and readers should treat it as a possible, but unconfirmed, direction in his career rather than an established fact.

Personal Life and Public Persona

By most accounts, Joshua Russaw keeps a relatively private personal life compared to other people connected to his family’s level of fame. He’s been described as single, with no widely reported public relationship, and as someone who prefers to keep his romantic life out of the spotlight.

His public persona, at least based on his social media presence, leans toward music, family moments, and travel rather than the kind of constant tabloid visibility that some celebrity children experience. He’s occasionally been photographed alongside high-profile figures from his mother’s and stepfather’s professional circles, which isn’t surprising given his family’s decades-long presence in the entertainment industry, but he doesn’t appear to actively court that kind of attention.

His Instagram handle, jahadrussaw, has amassed a meaningful following, accounts differ slightly on the exact number, but it’s generally described as being in the tens of thousands, and serves as the main window the public has into his day-to-day life, music, and creative projects.

Family Ties: A Complicated but Close-Knit Web

To really understand Joshua Russaw, it helps to understand just how interconnected his family is:

• Mother: Faith Evans, Grammy-winning R&B singer, songwriter, and producer, famously the first woman signed to Bad Boy Entertainment.
• Father: Todd Russaw, music industry executive, producer, and talent manager, married to Faith Evans from roughly 1998 to 2011.
• Half-brother: Christopher C.J. Wallace Jr., son of Faith Evans and The Notorious B.I.G., and Joshua’s musical collaborator in CJ & Jahad.
• Siblings: Ryder Evan Russaw (brother) and Chyna Tahjere Griffin (sister).
• Stepfather (former): Stevie J, record producer, married to Faith Evans from 2018 to roughly 2021.

This family tree places Joshua at the intersection of two enormously influential musical legacies: his mother’s decades in R&B, and, through his half-brother, the enduring legacy of The Notorious B.I.G., one of the most important figures in hip-hop history. It’s a lot of history to carry, and it’s part of why Joshua’s low-key approach to his own career has stood out to some observers: rather than leaning heavily on either legacy, he’s tried to build something that’s recognizably his own, even while working closely with his brother.

Net Worth: What’s Actually Known

Various celebrity biography sites estimate Joshua Russaw’s net worth at around $500,000, attributing his income to a combination of DJing, music production, modeling, and brand collaborations. It’s worth being clear-eyed about a number like this: net worth estimates for people who aren’t mainstream, highly documented public figures are almost always rough approximations pieced together from public appearances, guesses about industry pay rates, and comparisons to similar public figures, not verified financial data. Treat any specific dollar figure attached to Joshua Russaw with a healthy amount of skepticism.

Joshua Russaw: A Career Timeline

Piecing together the publicly available information, here’s a rough timeline of Joshua Russaw’s life and career so far:

• 1998, Born Joshua Jahad Russaw on June 10 in Los Angeles, California, to Faith Evans and Todd Russaw, shortly after their marriage.
• Early 2000s–2010s, Grows up in a musically immersed household, spending time around recording studios and live performances through both parents’ careers.
• 2011, Faith Evans and Todd Russaw divorce after roughly 13 years of marriage.
• Mid-2010s, Begins developing his own interest in music, working on beats and DJ sets and gradually building skills in production.
• 2017, Publicly emerges as part of the duo CJ & Jahad alongside his half-brother C.J. Wallace, with reports that the two were recording a debut project together.
• Late 2010s, Continues building his identity as DJ Jahad, performing at industry events and reportedly working as a tour DJ connected to his mother’s live shows; also becomes associated with a collective sometimes referred to as Non-Fiction.
• 2018, Faith Evans marries producer Stevie J, adding another chapter to the family’s musical ties.
• Early 2020s, Faith Evans and Stevie J divorce; Joshua continues developing his production and DJ work while also picking up modeling opportunities and brand collaborations.
• 2026, Continues to work as DJ Jahad, described by recent write-ups as refining his sound, building collaborations, and performing at events, while maintaining a relatively private personal life.

This timeline is necessarily incomplete, much of Joshua’s career has unfolded outside of major music press coverage, but it traces a clear arc from childhood immersion in music, to early collaboration with his brother, to a steadily developing solo identity as DJ Jahad.

Conclusion

Joshua Russaw’s story doesn’t fit the mold of the overnight celebrity-child sensation. He grew up with about as much proximity to musical greatness as anyone could, a Grammy-winning mother, a music-industry father, and a half-brother whose own father remains one of the most influential rappers of all time, and rather than cashing in on that immediately, he’s taken a slower, more deliberate route into the business as DJ Jahad.

Whether it’s his work producing and performing solo, his collaborations with C.J. Wallace as CJ & Jahad, or his occasional modeling and brand work, Joshua appears to be someone still very much in the process of defining his own creative identity, on his own timeline. Given how much of his public information comes from secondary biography sites rather than major music press, much of his career is likely still unfolding out of the mainstream spotlight, and depending on how his projects with his brother develop, that could change in the years ahead.

For now, the clearest picture of Joshua Russaw is this: a musician and creative from one of R&B and hip-hop’s most storied families, working steadily to build a name that’s his own, DJ Jahad, while staying rooted in the family and legacy that shaped him.

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