DJ Gano “shows up and shows out”
DJ Gano stands on the stage behind a sound desk as purple and red hues of strobe lights illuminate his dancing audience of college students and Boulder community members.
As his crowd at Boulder’s Fox Theater expands, he incorporates several genres into one set, playing dubstep rhythm with tech house elements and other abstract sounds.
Reflecting on his live performances at The Fox and Boulder Theatre, Gano said, “Having a musical background, you can do a lot more flashy things.”
Fellow friend and DJ Ryan Harve has performed alongside Gano for years and speaks to his style of performance.
“Most times when I or other DJs go into a set we have boundaries of how far we want to deviate from that specific style we’re going for … Gano is not afraid to deviate from it. He stays true to himself, every set he plays something super gnarly that people do end up loving,” Harve said.
Daniel Gano who was born and raised in Denver, Colorado has been taking over the Boulder DJ scene show by show, including performances with Malaa, Ardalan and Blunts and Blondes.
Gano’s musical education, style and overall engagement with Boulder fans is what set him apart from other student DJs at The University of Colorado Boulder.
The 21-year-old DJ attributes his successful style to growing up playing piano at his dad’s house, participating in the arts program at Cherry Creek High school and printing out lines of sheet music to persistently practice on the donated piano in his fraternity house.
Incorporating these years of experience into his sets and mixes make his sound different. He is able to use rhythm to control his sets while incorporating both abstract sounds and old crowd favorites that everyone knows the lyrics to.
Gano’s father was a DJ himself, but that is not what pushed Gano to become one. He does admit that his father’s involvement in music and equipment made him curious about the world of music.
Gano’s ability to quickly learn the ins and outs of DJ technicalities and level up sound boards was not necessarily what he or his father was expecting.
“He never really brought it on me; we were both surprised,” Gano said. “Eventually he was paying for a DJ instructor at Global Dance, and by my senior year I had already mastered and outgrown my board.”
At the beginning of Gano’s DJ career in High School he felt he was navigating the world of DJing for himself, although he credits his encouragement from his father to the success of his first performances in 2016 at the Cherry Creek High School talent show.
“The talent show was huge for me- that’s when I really started getting my name out there,” Gano said.
By the time the next talent show had come around, he was using more than his board and a speaker. He had now incorporated the use of turntables where the sound of his mixing was in full effect.
Gano remembers these performances as career highlights when his peers were jumping up and down in the school auditorium.
His career began to flourish when he left his Denver school’s auditorium for his dorm room in Boulder.
On his first Friday at CU, Gano was DJing in his dorm room in Cheyenne Arapaho
“My place was packed; we were blasting my big speaker, and that is when I was like ‘Yep, I wanna do this,’” Gano said.
Harve, who has played alongside Gano at local performances, remembers their first shows together playing on Farrand Field in the spring of 2019 and recognizes the growth they’ve made as artists can be attributed to one another.
“I must’ve met him the first or second week of freshman year in the dorms… and he kinda showed me the way from there,” said Harve.
Harve appreciates Gano as one of the first people he shares new songs and ideas with and one of the first people he calls up to play a set along with him.
From then on, playing fraternity parties, birthdays and even graduation events, Gano had not yet anticipated the crowds of hundreds he would be playing in front of at Boulder venues.
“I can’t remember if it was him or I that said it, but I remember one of us saying, ‘I want to hear sounds I’ve never heard before, sounds I can’t even conceptualize how they were produced and that definitely holds true for his and my style,” Harve said.
When Gano saw his first Malaa show at age 17 he remembers feeling stimulated by his EDM sound. Now after opening for Malaa in concert Gano is able to reflect on his growth as a performer and masterer.
“If you told me back then, ‘Yo, you’re gonna open for this guy your senior year of college,’ I would have told you to shut up,” Gano said with a laugh. “It’s super surreal; it all happened so fast.”
Gano admits he looks back and remembers people early on who poked fun at his extensive use of EDM in his sets, and says he slowly changed people’s minds.
“Seeing a bunch of old faces in the crowd, kids from high school who were at that talent show, it’s so funny to me,” Gano said. “It has been a ride, honestly.”
Coming up in the Boulder scene, he relied on connections and motivation from people like Harve. Although building connections was the hard part of the battle, showing clips of his successful shows to hiring talent agents and producers came easy for Gano.
Growing a producer network through outreach of social media is vital for Gano. Through this outreach the Boulder community has helped grow the crowds at Gano’s shows.
Boulder’s significance is reflected in how producers like Fisher play sold out shows in stadiums and fields and in turn are willing to perform in the 625 seat Boulder Theatre.
“Malaa could have gone anywhere in Colorado, and he chose Boulder,” said Gano, who feels Boulder is an iconic spot for DJs and house artists, which made it a bigger deal and much more significant experience for him.
Now, Gano is having his chance to showcase talents in the same environments as artists who have amassed millions of monthly listeners on Spotify and headline million-dollar tours.
Known for the liveliness of his crowd, Gano himself says, “The crowd is half the show.”
Having 35 minutes to “show up and show out,” Gano appreciates that his crowd reacts so well to his upbeat set of 16 songs that were delivered and received exactly how he had planned despite not being able to constantly practice and have access to the nearly $3,000 industry standard CDJ board.
Gano wants the Boulder community to know he is a DJ at heart not a producer, but fans will catch him being, “one of the most technical DJs (they’ll) hopefully ever come across.”
Harve, who acknowledges himself as more of a producer respects Gano as a pro.
“I remember at one of our first performances I wanted to play the most basic stuff, things no one would get upset with,” Harve said. “(Gano) was like ‘I’m not going that way’ and I think that epitomizes his style, he stays true to himself.”
Because of all that goes into his set preparations, he doesn’t take requests, However he’d make an exception for a private event if arranged ahead of time.
Gano’s support from his CU Boulder peers motivates and enables him to play more shows. Gano and his fellow DJs get paid a flat rate, but it is the performances they crave because of the “absolutely electric” environment the performer and audience share.
“We’re selling upward of $3,200 in tickets and getting paid a flat rate of $50,” Gano said. “The fact that we get all these people to come out and support every time, it helps us get paid a little bit but mostly it helps us get more shows- and that’s all we really want and it’s all we crave for.”
