Jesse Palencia
Chicago
Dj Persist began his interest in djing at the age of 17. While in high school, he was involved in Radio Arte 90.5fm, a youth operated radio station. There he met, Sal Garcia aka Dj Greedy (www.djgreedy.com) who is the current host of the legendary radio show The Hot Mix Show. He began to sit in during his shows and see some of chicagos underrated djs such as Dj Havoc, Dj Mayhem, Dj Mos Def, Dj Prodigy, and many more. So impressed by their mixing skills he was inspired to take up djing. From there was nothing stopping him.
He bought his first vinyl turntables (Gemini, he was broke at the time) and began mixing house music in his bedroom just like any other dj. He started off with the name Dj Probe, but after being told from another DJ that the name Probe had been taken by another dj in Chicago, he decided to change his name. The name "Persist" comes from persistent, a name that was given by his fraternity who had seen the characteristic in his work ethic.
He started to leave the bedroom and hit the radio waves and house parties. Influenced by Dj Greedy, Persist started a radio show on 90.5fm, called House Groove, where he invited guest djs to mix live on the air. Such guests included, Crazy Cuts Carlos, David Vasquez, Dj Hypnotize, Dj Elite, Dj Revel, Dj Guess, Dj Ajax and many more. He also started up a dj crew called fusion production, where they coordinated parties in the southside Chicago. Doing many collaborations with the legendary Imagine Chicago, he began to network with many of Chicago’s best djs such as Dj Rampage, DJ Elite, Dj Eddie V, DJ Ora, Dj Scream, Mike 2 Smooth, David Vasquez, and many others. After graduating from high school, he left fusion and decided to go on to college.
Persist went off to University of Illinois in order to pursue his degree in Business Administration. Being that he wasn’t in Chicago anymore, he had to adapt to another environment. UIUC crowd wasn’t a big fan of house music as Persist realized it during his first gig at UIUC. During his freshmen year he began to learn how to mix hip-hop, reggeaton, and latin. Being in college gave him a lot of networking opportunities as he began to mix out of the state such as Wisconsin, Missouri, Tennessee, and Texas.
Upon graduating from college, Persist moved to Houston, Texas and took his DJ talent with him. He wanted to revolutionize his performances by starting to Video Mix. Being able to add visuals to live mixing gave Persist an edge over other DJs in Texas. He was able to make guest appearances at clubs in Houston, Austin, College Station, and Denton. Returning to Chicago in 2010, Persist had become an official V5 DJ with a Saturday residency at Transit Nightclub, in addition to a 1st Friday of the month appearance at V-Live.
With 10 years of mixing under his belt, there is still a lot of potential for Persist. So be on the lookout for DJ Persist at a party near you!
DJ Persist’s tracks
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