Convening Confessions from a Conference DJ
On progressive movement conferences, Kamala Harris stage jumpers, and why great event don't require a 5-person panel
I used to be a pretty cool DJ for some of the nation’s top political events. DJing gave me all kinds of opportunities to be in big rooms with presidential candidates, politicos, celebrities, and VERY stressed-out staff people with headsets saying things like, “Can we get eyes on the Senator?” It also gave me one of the best educations I have ever had in convening, because when you are the DJ, you are not just there for the music. You are standing in the weird little intersection of the vibe, logistics, ego, production, panic, and performance.
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You see everything—from the front to the back of the house. You observe what the audience is doing and what the staff is trying not to do (which is crash out). You see who planned for the energy of the space, and who thought a panel of seven people with no slides was somehow going to save democracy.
In 2019, two organizations that really knew how to put on an event were MoveOn and Planned Parenthood Action Fund (PPAF). After Greg’s last post on the issues with the big conference format, the former CEO of MoveOn, Rahna Epting, commented on my LinkedIn and sent me a message that took me down memory lane. Imagine, it’s the Pre-Trump era. This is back when political events were trying to get people activated without making them want to fake a family emergency and leave during lunch. MoveOn and PPAF played a critical role in our ecosystem in bringing people together, and in almost all of the events I got to be part of, they made it happen without the room feeling like a hostage situation (which is no small feat).
The Planned Parenthood Effect: democracy, but make it a party!
The first event, We the People, was hosted by Planned Parenthood Action Fund in a theater in Washington, D.C. I was there as the DJ (and I was also on staff at PPAF at the time) with my instructor, DJ Sixth Sense, because I was petrified I would mess up.
The room was electric, and our esteemed host, Kelley Robinson (now president of the Human Rights Campaign), had the floor. Coalition partners everywhere, candidates with their chiefs of staff, and PPAF staff people who actually seemed to know what the hell they were doing, which is always very sexy in an organizing space. The event was political, but it was also fun. Which, frankly, is something too many progressive spaces still treat like a suspicious concept.
Sometimes folks act as if people having fun means they are not being serious enough about liberation, and I reject that.
PPAF understood something simple: if you want people energized, the room has to have energy (not a foreign concept and yet…). If you want them activated, the event itself has to feel activating, and if you want people to believe another world is possible, the atmosphere cannot feel like a mandatory training followed by dry cookies.
While many people hire DJ’s with good intentions, I learned that most people forget the DJ. They remember the speakers, the stage, the program, the candidate with the walk-on song, but they don’t always remember that there is a human being over there literally creating the emotional weather of the room, and probably playing the role of a second host.
PPAF event planners and designers did NOT forget that.
They respected the people behind the scenes, and they understood that energy is not accidental—it is built and adjusted in real time, part of the overall event experience and the strategy for building political power.
The MoveOn Moment: if you stay ready, you ain’t got to get ready
The second event was in 2019 in San Francisco, and I was sooooo excited. A Big Ideas forum featuring major Democratic candidates such as then-Senator Kamala Harris, Senators Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker, and Elizabeth Warren —to name a few—and I was geeked to be the house DJ.
This event was polished in a way that actually changed how I thought about convening and event production.
They had every major news outlet (CNN, MSNBC, Fox, you name it), sophisticated production, excellent sound, and a real security team with a plan. They had professional makeup artists (because HD is unforgiving), hairstylists, and a full stage crew managing every detail.
Honestly, there is something deeply comforting about watching an organization not just wing it, but bring in the “big dog” experts for their event.
Too many groups are out here trying to produce major public events with one Canva account, two exhausted staff people, and the audacity of hope, but MoveOn was not doing that. They hired the right people, and it created organization and confidence. It invited the kind of room where people could focus on the event instead of trying to survive the lack of planning.
Then, because life loves a test, the planning got tested.
Right before we went on, we did a real security briefing. With all of those candidates, there was a chance someone might try to protest, so we had a simple but serious plan for who would move, who would respond, and how we’d keep the crowd calm.
Then in the middle of the event, while I was on stage minding my own business, watching Karine Jean-Pierre (who later became White House Press Secretary under President Biden) interviewed Kamala Harris about her big idea, and mid-sentence, a PROTESTOR JUMPED ON THE STAGE.
Y’all, I wanted to pass out.
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I didn’t know if it was a hostile takeover or a hippie trying to grab the mic, but I knew in the moment we needed to spring into action—so we did. Karine literally did the best interception of life and protected Vice President Harris. I saw her husband, Doug, and Secret Service run out there faster than I could turn my head, and when I looked into the crowd, all I saw was panic. So I got my act in order, grabbed the mic while all the chaos was unfolding next to me, and used humor and my talking points to calm the crowd down. Between linebacker Karine and my mic check, the audience was at ease-ish.
The room could have easily gone into chaos, but it didn’t.
Not because everybody magically rose to the occasion, because they had a plan, and Karine was incredible. The security team knew what to do. The production people knew what to do, and I knew what to do. The event did not fall apart because the people responsible for holding it had actually imagined that life might happen.
That is the lesson. A room can hold surprise when the people behind it have prepared for reality.
Too many organizations want magic without an infrastructure, excellence without a clear investment from the full staff, and a seamless experience built on hustle, vibes, and one over-functioning woman who has been carrying the whole thing since Tuesday.
That is not a strategy, and it's a recipe for burnout and disaster.
What both events taught me
These were two very different events. Different vibes. Same truth.
Here’s my hot take: plan your events to be a good time. I know that is controversial in circles where suffering feels like a sign of seriousness, but I stand by it. You can do hard things and still create a room people are excited to be in. You can build power and let people breathe. You can talk about democracy without making the room feel like detention.
And please plan for what could go wrong, because “we will figure it out” is not a strategy; it is a threat. It’s a threat to your staff, your speakers, your audience, and whoever ultimately bears the consequences of your underplanning.
My very humble professional recommendation: if you want to have the best event, hire a DJ. At a minimum, hire someone whose whole job is to care about the energy in the room—because someone should.
Too many events are out here expecting a panel discussion and a bowl of mixed greens to carry the spirit of the people.
That is not enough. Not for power, definitely not for joy, and certainly not for what people paid to be there.
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I feel like this substack was written for me - just commented on Gregory's post too. This is me at GAIN Power - ...." trying to produce major public events with one Canva account, two exhausted staff people, and the audacity of hope...." maybe a bit more than two staff but point is the same