Hi, I’m Leon! (Gov’t name: Leon Lee / DJ name: Leon de La $co.) Pronouns: he/him. I’m a DJ, creative freelancer, and the creator of Ella Luv Co.

Hometown: San Francisco
Education: City College of San Francisco, UC Riverside, UC San Diego

DJ Style: I started out mainly DJing Hip-Hop, R&B, and old school funk/soul. But I love playing open format, so I stay sharp across every genre. It's always fun to read the room, drop some teasers to see which direction I can go, and get that hype reaction when the crowd says: "how did the DJ know about THIS song?"

When it comes to my approach, I’m not much of a ‘pick me’ type of DJ. I do appreciate flashier tricks, but I think there’s a time and place for that. I think that great DJs are the ones that make it look easy. The ones that make the music flow so naturally that people get so lost in the moment of having fun, they forget the DJ is even there.

MC Style: I’m a confident MC and can adapt my energy based on the environment. Just like DJing, I think the MC’s job is to direct the spotlight to the shared moment versus making the show all about me. I’m not personally a fan of when DJs/MCs are on the mic way too much.

I grew up in San Francisco and came from an immigrant family. We weren’t in the best neighborhoods but were privileged to be around people from diverse backgrounds and cultures. I learned early on that music was a powerful way to bring people together.

I’ve always been surrounded by music. I was a b-boy as a kid (‘breakdancing’ is the commercial term, iykyk). Got into producing music as a teen. I worked multiple jobs to buy my first set of turntables at 18. Early on, I would help some of the DJ homies haul crates, and cover their bathroom breaks to get a few minutes on the decks.

I didn't just love music; I studied it. I earned formal certifications in audio production and worked in professional radio as a Board Operator for 102.9FM KBLX. (Fun fact: At the time, the station was part of one of the first Black-owned commercial broadcast companies in the country.)

I eventually moved to SoCal to study media and culture at UC Riverside for undergrad and UC San Diego for an Ethnic Studies Ph.D. program. I taught university courses on music and culture and ran Hip-Hop programs for youth—all while DJing every weekend.

It might look like a hard pivot—moving from academia to the DJ booth full-time—but I see it more as a culmination. Honestly, I never went to grad school to be a researcher. I went to work on my ‘why’. To me, technical skills are just the baseline. The real work is in finding your place within the culture—honoring the history and the conversations that this medium grew out of. That’s what actually makes a great DJ. You can't hold space for a room if you aren't willing to get to know the art beyond the aesthetic.

I didn't start Ella Luv Co to be a "Founder" (not actually a fan of the word). I started it because I couldn't find another way to do this work with the level of care it deserves—and I could no longer be an accomplice to problematic industry norms.

Here’s the tea. I've worked at other well-known DJ companies and was even the highest-reviewed DJ and a manager at one of SoCal's largest wedding DJ companies. I trained other DJs, handled client communications, built industry relationships, and—more often than I'd like to admit—quietly used my own gear to replace old, worn-out equipment, just because I didn't want to risk anything failing at somebody's wedding.

I saw a path toward professional oversight and ethical growth, but the companies I worked for always seemed to revert to volume-first models—lack of transparency, top-down management, minimal reinvestment. Maybe that's most industries: the actual workers are always the ones filling the gaps to make sure things are done right for the clients.

I even worked somewhere where I came to find out that a high-ranking, sales-obsessed executive was a former lawyer disbarred for fraud (things started making so much sense once I found that out)! I think we should treat companies like dating apps these days—and research them before the red flags surprise you. When you keep spotting patterns of people being lied to, wage gaps, male egos, etc., you have two choices: shrink yourself to hold that system up, or walk away and build something better.

I didn't start this out of spite or to compete with "big box" agencies. I don't even believe in competition—there's work out there for everyone. I do, however, believe that chasing volume at the expense of people is a broken structure. My vision was to build something completely different—a people-first approach.

No pushiness or "slick" sales speak. No lack of transparency. No bait-and-switching. I'm ditching all the strategies you'll find in an outdated (and slimy) used car sales playbook in favor of honesty and mutual respect. We reject the old guard, even if that means some gates get kept tighter.

Instead, we operate through a framework of reciprocity. We prioritize human well-being over transactional relationships. We resist the corporate norm of extracting labor from workers and capital from consumers without continual reinvestment. As our infrastructure grows, so will our commitment to empathy, transparency, living wages, and community building.

Ella Luv Co is a boutique creative studio and DJ service built on radical integrity. We’ve traded the "DJ Factory" approach for a "Value-First" philosophy. We lead with empathy—not as a marketing buzzword, but as a technical requirement.