DJ-U: Creating a Network of Non-Binary People of Color

Minneapolis, MN — Inside Wax World, Rosa Garcia’s South Minneapolis record store, the DJ known as Madre Rosa reflects on DJ-U, a program built from turntables, community, and care. After losing its funding, the free program that trained more than 100 non-binary artists of color may be coming to an end.

Unicorn Riot spoke with Garcia and DJ-U alum Makeda at Wax World about the program’s history, its impact and what could be lost if it ends. See our short video special below with a 20-minute version underneath and shorts on Garcia’s benefit-events and messaging from visiting DJs further down in the article.

Piloted in 2016 at the queer underground space Madame of the Arts, and officially started in 2018, Garcia described DJ-U as a “reparations program” created to “repair that bridge that somewhere had gotten broken.”

DJ-U has been outlined as a “skill-sharing/support community for Black/Indigenous women, queer, femme, and non-binary people of color.” The program’s mission is “to create a network of aspiring and experienced self-identified femme, non-binary people of color that have a shared passion for music and community.”

Through the program, artists are supported and empowered by mentors while being given access to DJ equipment, instructions, and connections to local venues and institutions “to ensure success and long term impact.”

With grant funding, DJ-U has been offered as a free program. The money from the grants goes straight to the DJs who are paid for teaching classes. Garcia said she’s “trying to continue to keep the dollars flowing in our community. If I’m going to get a grant, I want to help us build money, shared power, community, space.”

“We spread $100K pretty much during our ten years with this group of people,” said Garcia, “and it is meant to continue to generate in the DJ scene and rotate through this community.” She says that DJ-U has succeeded in changing the musical landscape of the Twin Cities with its DJ economy and promoting and connecting artists of color.

“There are hundreds of people every weekend that are hearing music that might have been touched by this program.”Rosa Garcia (DJ Madre Rosa)

Recalling her experience eight years ago in DJ-U’s first program after its pilot, Makeda said the biggest gift from the program was being around “such cool and creative” people like fellow DJ-U alums Yonci Jameson and Dua Saleh, and meeting “ambitious Black women and Black queer people my age.” “The ambition,” she says, is “the hardest thing to come by.”

She’s still connected to the mentors and other alum. “There’s been so many cool-ass people that I was able to share space with and learn from,” Makeda said. “It’s really nice to be surrounded with people that you want to be like, or you’re happy to be like.”

It’s not been an easy decade for DJ-U, however, as the program has borne the brunt of some traumatic tribulations in south Minneapolis over the last decade, including multiple building fires.

In 2018, DJ-U programming happened in a studio space with Garcia, Ms. Lakesha and other artists in the Roberts Shoes building on Chicago Ave. and Lake St. before the building burned down — a huge loss to the Minneapolis arts community. This forced the program to relocate.

In 2020, DJ-U was being held in a large 5,000 sq. foot room in the Ivy Building and then came the Coronavirus pandemic. In-person programming was suspended and just a few months later in late May, the building was set aflame from falling ashes during fires from the George Floyd Uprising.

This time their equipment wasn’t totaled but everything needed to be dried out after the sprinkler system in the building doused everything in the rooms.

In 2026, effectively their tenth year, DJ-U was impacted by the U.S. government’s deadly Operation Metro Surge and has additionally lost its funding. However, Garcia said that “if folks would like to donate to the program, well maybe we could” have another year of programming.

On 36th Ave. and Lake St. in south Minneapolis, Garcia’s record store Wax World, was deeply impacted by the federal occupation. She was forced to close her store for three weeks.

Despite facing the hardships, Garcia still holds Open Decks, allowing for DJs to come in and DJ at her store and she still lends out and gives away equipment.

Additionally, in the realm of mutual aid, Wax World has held multiple benefit events, fundraising for local businesses that were financially impacted by the federal occupation. The first event was a two-day, 15-hour DJ stream in January that was organized after Renee Good was killed by federal agents. On the second day of the stream, Alex Pretti was killed by federal agents.

A series of benefit shows dubbed DJs Eat ICE have been hosted by Wax World. The first one was held on May 1 and another is slated for tonight, August 14 at the Red Sea starting at 8 p.m.

Relatedly, visiting DJs like Griz have also contributed to those impacted. In March, Griz donated $137,000, the profits of all merchandise sold at two Minneapolis shows, to mutual aid network Neighbors Helping Neighbors. In a social media post, Griz said “seeing the impact of ICE on marginalized folks in this city made it clear where that money actually belongs.”