Volunteer DJ K y La Joanita is one of five rotating hosts on WERU’s jubilant music show Sabor Latino, heard 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday evenings. Starting in February 2025, she’s the show’s newest member, so maybe you haven’t yet had a chance to catch her special brand of DJing, but I’ll bet you may have heard her speak on show promos talking about how Sabor Latino inspires her whole family to dance together in the kitchen! Like many WERU volunteer DJs, music and dancing permeate and perfume her world, go deep, and trace back to her family and its influences. When we reached out to ask about sharing her profile with the WERU family, she was thrilled to give her listeners some insight into inspiration for her music programming and her historical and cultural roots. Here’s K y La Joanita in her own words:

Music is one of the spaces where I feel completely at ease and comfortable in myself. It is one of my happy places. I have always been into music, always playing with one band or another since my teens. At this moment in my life with a baby and a two-year-old, I don’t have the kind of time that’s needed to play in a band, but luckily DJing feels like a natural evolution of my love of music and a way I can express that love. I deeply love music, but I’m also a book worm. I was a high-school English teacher before having kids and I’ll go back to that one day. As a kid, I wasn’t the one who really got into much trouble—but I would get into a little trouble for staying up too late reading. I learned to be sneaky about it by reading under my blankets with a flashlight. I was a rebel.

Throughout my life music has always been all around me. My parents would take me to dances and I would watch them dance the Cumbia and Salsa as a little girl. As a child I had an oldies phase—I just loved the music of the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. As an older child my parents joined the church scene and, musically speaking, that had both advantages and disadvantages—I was encouraged to listen only to Christian music which was limiting, but at the same time I was able to perform with the house band at church which was so neat because we played a fusion of genres: salsa, cumbia, pop, rock—all mingling to form a unique sound. When I left for college, I finally began exploring all the genres and found enjoyment in all styles of music, though I naturally gravitate to alternative/indie and pop.

I am passionate about community radio because you can enjoy a greater variety of music and find cool new artists and songs you otherwise wouldn’t ever have heard of. As a DJ on community radio there are fewer barriers to getting a chance at hosting a show which makes community radio a more accessible and welcoming place to newcomers. Coming to DJ a show was kind of simple for me, really. One day I emailed DJ Cheo of Sabor Latino about some upcoming Latino community events and he emailed back saying “thanks!” and asked me if I knew anyone who wanted to DJ. I said I did!

So far, my favorite memory of volunteering at WERU was when my parents came into town and I brought them to ride along with me while DJing my show in the WERU studios. I dedicated the show to them by theming it around the music they grew up on. My playlist brought back so many memories for us all—the music made them cry real tears, it made them sing, it made them dance! I can’t think of a better example of the power of music. If you are interested in volunteering at WERU, get in touch with the station! I can absolutely say the experience of volunteering at WERU community radio is meaningful, beautiful, and worth the effort. You won’t regret it.