D’Vonna Miller Wants You to Do It Yourself
“No one is going to create these spaces for you. You have to go out and work and create them yourself.”
Written by Andres Garcia
Photo courtesy of @cripplebird on Instagram
Content warning: This story contains discussions of sexual assault and abuse.
Music is cathartic. It is often used as a form of escapism. Not only does music sonically stimulate someone, but often it grants them the opportunity to slip away from reality, even if just for a little while. All the while, music can force vulnerability. It can turn a mirror on listeners and force them to reflect upon themselves and the society around them.
Music is also communal. To be able to share such a cathartic experience with a community of people is something to be cherished and preserved, according to San Antonio musician and talent buyer D’Vonna Miller.
Miller is a queer, 21-year-old biracial Black musician who is best known for their long-time involvement in San Antonio’s local music scene. They started playing live music in 2012 under the moniker Odd & Grey alongside long-time friend Joslyn Daniel.
Miller said that Odd & Grey would regularly perform at established local venues, but would get a less-than-desirable payout almost every time. “When we started playing shows as a girl band, we were treated like little girls,” Miller says. “We’d sort of get taken advantage of.”
After high school, Miller pursued a Bachelor in Fine Arts for Performing Arts at St. Edward’s University in Austin. After spending two years at SEU, they decided not to continue and moved back to San Antonio, where they then rejoined the local music community.
“I got back and noticed a lack of spaces for queer people,” Miller says.
Since then, Miller has embarked on a two-year journey to create diverse and safe spaces in San Antonio with help from many other San Antonio creatives such as musician and San Antonio DIY veteran Elena Lopez and fellow queer artist Alyson Alonzo.
Many survivors who are part of San Antonio’s local music community have come forward with their accounts of sexual assault and abuse in the past several years. Among those accused were musicians, sound technicians, and heads of local record labels. “The communal catharsis of music is compromised when abusers infiltrate a music community,” Miller says.
Nowadays it takes research and motivation to book shows, according to Miller, not only to make sure that concert-goers are comfortable, but also to make sure a concert bill has a diverse spectrum of artists.
Miller recalled a moment in which Lopez comforted them in their moment of distress with lack of representation and safety in the scene. “(Elena) told me something along the lines of, ‘No one is going to create these spaces for you. You have to go out and work and create them yourself,’” Miller says.
Miller credits Lopez and other members of the community, namely members of San Antonio band Booty Feet, for being catalysts in protecting concert-goers. They said that Lavender Town and South Newby — two former DIY house venues in San Antonio — were the trailblazers in creating safe spaces.
South Newby is Lopez’s former home. She, along with Miller and the boys in Booty Feet, frequently organized house shows there. Miller said that friends and concert-goers would arrive expecting — and were arguably entitled to — a safe environment. According to Miller, a few people who were blacklisted from South Newby’s events showed up to a few of the events that were held at the house after being explicitly told that they were unwelcome. A fight broke out on one occasion.
Makayla Frazier is a local activist and long-time concert-goer in the scene. She says that she attends at least one local show per week. “Pretty often I find myself hesitant to go to shows,” Frazier says with a tone that spelled out her disappointment. “It f—---ing sucks!”
Frazier says she holds Miller’s events to high esteem, however.
“Established venues and bookers don’t care who shows up. They just want your money,” Frazier says. “That’s what separates (Miller) from them.”
Frazier also established that she believes that the community must be critically introspective when creating boundaries and blacklisting people from shows. “Are they abusive or are they just shitty people?” Frazier ponders.
Miller has also worked with San Antonio musician Dominic Walsh in ensuring that local shows are safe environments for everyone who attends. Walsh is in his fourth year at Trinity University. He first became involved with the San Antonio music scene in 2015 and has played drums for several different bands since then. He formerly played drums in Lopez’s band, Elnuh.
Many talent buyers in the Central Texas music scene don’t take the safety and comfort of concert-goers seriously enough, according to Walsh. He reinforced his viewpoint by stating that bands who have a history of abuse are often booked to open for touring bands at established venues in San Antonio. “There are so many other bands who don’t have a history of abuse to choose from,” Walsh says. “We don’t want abusers representing the scene.”
Walsh also says that representation on concert bills is “important and good.” “San Antonio is, like, 65% hispanic,” Walsh says. “If you book an all white or all male bill… how did you even manage to do that?”
Musician Samantha Flowers also took notice of a lack of diversity in local talent booked by established venues. “It’s hard to get on their bills,” Flowers says. “They get the same (local bands) to play, like, all the time. And often its abusers or people with shady pasts.” Flowers says that she is happy with the trajectory in which the climate of the local music scene is headed, thanks to people like Miller.
Ultimately, people who book shows in the local music scene “just need to do their f—--ing research,” according to Miller. “If you can’t at least do that... you’re not sh-t.”
Folllow D’Vonna on Instagram and Twitter and stream their music here.