25 Years Of Spreading The Lurve

Ambrose Harcourt - Mr Lurve

He is the Barry White of Sussex and there aren’t many people in the area who can say we haven’t heard his deep romantic tones on the radio.

Ambrose Harcourt, “Mr Lurve” is celebrating 25 years of spreading the Lurve to Sussex, London and the Southeast of England where he has been broadcasting all this time.

He joined Southern Sound Radio in 1986 to present a Soul and R & B show on Saturdays, called SOUL DIRECTION. The show finished at 11pm and then there was a sponsored show which ran from 11pm till Midnight when the station closed down for the night.

The sponsored show ran its course and was not renewed. The Managing Director at the time, Rory McLeod called in and asked for ideas how the hour could be filled. Without hesitation, Ambrose suggested, an hour of Love songs and that is how THE LOVE HOUR was born.

Within the first month, response and feedback was unbelievable. At its best, the Love Hour was receiving 200 to 250 letters a week to the show. Remember in those days, there was no email, no text messages, facebook or twitter. The show became massive and staff at the radio station nicknamed Ambrose, Mr Lurve.

The success of the show was amazing, from one night a week to 3 nights a week and eventually to 7 nights a week.

With success comes greater responsibility and name changes. The Love Hour later became a daily 3 hour show first, NIGHTIME HEART & SOUL and later THE LOVE ZONE and was broadcast not only in Sussex but also the Southern Radio Group, sometimes 6 days a week and later 3 nights a week. He also broadcast for the Capital Radio Group throughout London and the south east of England.

The high point of the show has always been the Love Bites top 3 where Ambrose gets to chat with the listeners about their 3 favourite love songs and things about life in general.

Compulsive listening is the way listeners describe it.

Ambrose believes that his show came before any of the other Love song shows on Commercial Radio today and definitely before the one on Radio 2. He was interviewed and auditioned for the Radio 2 show before Steve Wright got it.

He currently presents the LOVE INN on Brighton’s Juice 107.2, Monday to Thursday 10pm till Midnight and has just celebrated his 3rd Anniversary on the show.

Over the years, Ambrose has met and interviewed many famous personalities as well as working for the BBC for a year in Television and Radio at Television Centre in London with BBC1, BBC2 and Radio Five Live, being the Resident DJ at trendy nightclub, ANNABELS in London’s Mayfair, meeting people like Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart, Bryan Adams, Angelina Jolie, Colin Firth, Michael Flatley and many more.

He also worked for ITV Meridian and SKY UK Living presenting the 8 week series of “Looking for Love” which was filmed in Brighton and many parts of Sussex.

But he says that meeting and interviewing Barry White has got to be up there, “To be with the Walrus Of Lurve” was something very special.

I remember him saying that “We might all eat different foods, drink different wines and speak different languages, but there is one thing that we all understand, the language of lurve.”

Being a man of love, Ambrose has been involved with many charities over the years and currently is Patron of Chestnut Tree House, the only children’s Hospice in Sussex, St Barnabas Hospice  and has worked with The Princes Trust, British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research, Scope, Mencap and many others.

Ambrose has so many great moments and stories to tell about the past 25 years of spreading the lurve, but says that helping listeners propose, dedications to mums in Maternity Units who were delivering their new babies to the world listening to Mr Lurve playing some great love songs, and some wonderful tales of what listeners got up to listening to him bring smiles to his face and ours.