Community Guest DJ: Amy Howard

This month we’re featuring Amy Howard, who has founded an amazing artist management house, Baby Riot Management, and who helps make Manos happen.

Check out more on Amy, and their favorite tunes here!

What do you do in the community?

I am the owner of Baby Riot Management, a cooperative community built on amplifying Queer, Disabled, Black, Brown, Indigenous, People of Color, and Women-identified independent musicians and artists – in which I support artists in varying managerial, booking, tour management, and consultation capacities as well as I provide live music production support for local Denver metro venues. I also serve Manos Sagrados with venue operations support and am a House Manager for the Denver Center for Performing Arts.

Tell us more about your background.

My background is varied, as I am often told that I go where I’m needed in my career endeavors, however the common thread in all my life endeavors has been a commitment to equity and justice. I have two Bachelor of Arts Degree, one in Theatre & Dance and one in Journalism (Print & Photo Media); a Master of Arts in Contemplative Education; and a partially completed PhD in Rhetoric, Theory, & Culture (I’m on a leave of absence because…life?). I worked 16 years in higher education from an adjunct lecturer to my last higher education role as the Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. At the end of my dedicated tenure within higher education and during COVID lockdown coupled with the surmounting political oppressions at that time, I evaluated the work I was doing, sat with my privileges and power, and decided to pursue a more intentional career in DEIA (diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, and justice) within the arts. I moved to Denver in 2021 to accept the role of Associate Concert Director for Swallow Hill Music and during my time doing amazing work alongside Bruce Trujillo, I observed opportunities to be even more intentional with my work in music and DEIAJ and thus, Baby Riot Management was born.

Why does representation matter in your community work?

As a Queer, Disabled, Nonbinary babe from a poor Biracial household, moving through this world, I became quickly aware of the limitations faced by me and others unlike me. For example, it was no mystery as to why my brother (a Queer Black individual) and I (a Queer White individual) had drastically different educational experiences – even though we went through the same school systems and had many of the same teachers. Where we grew up in small town New Hampshire, the community, the school we went to, and even the teacher population were all predominantly white, straight, and cisgender communities.

Growing up in the early aughts of the 90s, representation was a spectacle of tropes and exaggerations – representation simply wasn’t a thing. I remember thinking to myself often about how I couldn’t be queer because I wasn’t “gay like that” or when I met my first trans comrade, I didn’t think I could be trans (and nonbinary was not even a colloquial conception at that time), because I wasn’t “trans like that”. In pop culture, anything we saw was as a representation of a historically excluded person was an egregious stereotype perpetrated often in an effort of exploitative comedic relief. I spent most of my formative years confused about how I felt about my body, how I felt about relationships with others, how I felt about identity, and it wasn’t until 2018 that I even felt remotely okay to begin to express and rest in my authentic self. It was after I met a nonbinary comrade that didn’t fit ANY trope or stereotype and expressed their whole self with such conviction, confidence, and freedom. I remember thinking “I AM that kind of trans.” I was 33 years old.

While I am acutely aware of the privileges and power I possess by being White in this hegemonic culture, I acknowledge the inequities that exist within our world and utilize my power and privilege to fight for, uplift, and amplify others. I know the personal importance of having representation and I want to leverage my abilities and privileges to support access for historically excluded artists and musicians and for our community.

Representation is hope, aspiration, affirmation. Representation is truth and allows for a holistic, more complete picture of our world.

What’s one way the community can uplift voices like yours?

I think there are two major ways that anyone can uplift voices like mine or those I’m uplifting is to DO THE WORK and SHOW UP. Everything starts with our individual selves and doing the inner (and outer) work is ESSENTIAL: Understanding the privileges and biases you possess; educating yourself; investing yourself into community exchanges; listening more than you believe you’re capable; and really working to understand the systemic ways in which folks unlike yourself are moving through the world differently; intentionally seeking your opportunities to disrupt and destroy those systems and obstacles as best you can with the power and privileges you possess.

Showing up is just that, SHOWING UP (which can look a lot of ways): Supporting local and independent music and art, supporting local protests/rallies, contributing to community fund crowdsourcing, reposting on social media, buying art and merch, inviting your community to events, etc. – whatever is your vibe and however you are able and capable to show up is vital.

How are you involved with Manos Sagrados?

I was fortunate enough to bear witness to the future dream of Manos in a sunny park with Brucie in the cool Fall of 2022 – we both dreamed of creating communities that truly support independent historically excluded musicians and artists. We mused of the engagements and experiences we would offer, the community we’d be able to build and amplify, and I’m lucky enough to have seen this dream come to life. I support Manos in every way that I can, sometimes as a spunky bartender, a sounding board, an errand runner, but mostly as the support to Bruce as the Venue Operations Director. As with most of my roles in life, I’m often behind the scenes helping to make things go smoothly and thoughtfully for our engagements and endeavors and ultimately, helping to maintain and bolster the work that Manos seeks to do now and in the future.

Playlist:

Bonfire – Childish Gambino

The Birds Pt. 1 – The Weeknd

From This Oil Can – Dan Andriano in the Emergency Room

Monster – Jax Anderson

Bring the Pain – Method Man

Mourning Text – Hodge

Siri, Open Tinder – Childbirth

Sativa – Jhené Aiko (ft. Swae Lee)

Everything Has An End, Even Sadness – Kaki King

Mute – Raja Kumari

BONUS - Baby Riot Playlist!

120K – Machéte Mouth (ft. Sista Killjoy & Harmony Rose)

Identity – Soy Celesté (ft. Joshua Trinidad & Pink Hawks)

Letters From The Future – s.t3v

La Siguanaba – Sara Curruchich

Guiame – LatinSoul

Get Off Miie – iies.

Tell Me – Britt Devens

Cuando El Rey Nimrod – Nani