Edgar Quiroz was still a teenager when he got his first look at the music industry from the inside.
The Guadalajara-born, Western Colorado-raised hip-hop artist had been making music since his early teens when he signed with a record label. The experience wasn’t what he’d imagined, and after leaving the label, Quiroz said he nearly walked away from music altogether.
Instead, at 18, he started his own.
La Familia Music Group began as a way for Quiroz, better known by his stage name EQ, to protect his music and take control of his career as an independent artist. More than a decade later, the now-29-year-old is the founder of both a record label and a nonprofit music academy that served more than 250 young people last year.
This weekend, that work will take over the Montrose Rotary Amphitheater for three days.
LFMG Music Academy will host the inaugural Common Ground Music & Arts Festival Friday through Sunday, Aug. 28-30, bringing live music, art, food and vendors together for a free festival that Quiroz hopes can grow into a signature Montrose event and a major fundraiser for the academy.
The free three-day festival runs Friday through Sunday, Aug. 28-30, at the Montrose Rotary Amphitheater, bringing together live music, art, food, vendors and other activities while supporting LFMG Music Academy.
For Quiroz, now the 501(c)(3) nonprofit academy’s executive director, the festival is an extension of work that began years ago and an attempt to create something new for Montrose.
From artist to academy
Before there was an LFMG Music Academy, Quiroz said teaching was already part of his life.
There are photos, he said, of himself at about 14 years old teaching music production and songwriting workshops at the Wilkinson Public Library to children only a few years younger than he was.
(Provided photo)
“Picture a 14-year-old kid teaching 9-year-olds,” Quiroz said. “I’ve always been just, I guess, a giver or wanted to share my craft.”
His music business continued to develop, and during the COVID-19 pandemic, Quiroz decided to take what might have seemed like an unusual gamble. He opened a recording studio in Montrose.
With businesses closed and few people looking for commercial space, he thought he might be able to lock in inexpensive rent.
The unit he found needed plenty of work, and Quiroz was still working a full-time job. He and others worked on the space themselves, hoping that by the time they finished, the world would be opening again.
“I had no idea what was happening. I don’t think anyone did,” Quiroz said. “This was really just a shot in the dark.”
The timing worked.
From the studio came another opportunity.
La Familia Music Group began offering summer programming for young people. The camps cost about $20, which Quiroz and his team thought was affordable. But for some families, it still wasn’t.
Quiroz said financial limitations and transportation were keeping some children from participating.
“I talked to my team and I said, ‘Hey, there’s no reason why our youth shouldn’t have access to this,’” Quiroz said. “And if money is the reason, then let’s make this program free.”
So that’s what they decided to do.
That decision drew attention from donors, funders and community members who told Quiroz that funding was available for exactly the kind of work his business was already doing — if it were done through a nonprofit.
LFMG Music Academy applied for nonprofit status in late 2022 and received its 501(c)(3) status around the beginning of 2023. Quiroz describes it as an extension of work La Familia Music Group had already begun.
“We were doing nonprofit work before we became a nonprofit,” he said.
(Provided photo)
The two organizations remain separate. La Familia Music Group LLC is the for-profit business and record label, while LFMG Music Academy is the nonprofit.
For the academy, LFMG stands for “Love, Family, Motivation, Greatness” — four values Quiroz said guide its approach to working with young people.
Meanwhile, Quiroz’s work on the business side has continued. La Familia Music Group was named Record Label of the Year by a Denver-based organization in 2024, while Quiroz has also received recognition through the BestSlope NEXTGEN Award and the Montrose Small Business Awards His work has been featured by Rocky Mountain PBS and Spoke+Blossom Magazine.
A place to belong
The academy has since moved into a larger space at 1025 E. Main St., between McDonald’s and Beer Barn.
The facility includes three recording studios, a multimedia space, lounge and stage.
Some of the youth who use it helped create it.
When programming was temporarily paused while the new space was being remodeled, Quiroz said students started reaching out asking how they could help get it open. They painted, helped build stages and took part in other work on the facility.
“It was really cool to see our youth invested in wanting to get this place up and running,” Quiroz said.
That was evidence that the students had begun to see the academy as their space.
That idea carries into “In the Lab,” the academy’s after-school program for youth ages 9 to 19.
Students don’t even have to make music when they arrive. They can simply hang out, Quiroz said.
A student might come in to spend time with friends, then see someone in another room learning production or playing an instrument. He said curiosity can do the rest.
His idea was to first create a place where young people feel loved and can be themselves. That creates a sense of family and belonging. And belonging can create motivation, whether that comes in the form of picking up a guitar, writing a first song or stepping onto a stage.
That curiosity, he said, can be the start of forming greatness, but the academy doesn’t decide what greatness means.
“We’re not identifying greatness for our youth,” Quiroz said. “The youth are identifying greatness for themselves.”
For one student, that could mean performing. For another, it could simply mean returning to the program another day, graduating from high school or getting into college.
And the program has grown rapidly.
Quiroz estimates LFMG served about 27 students during its first year. In 2025, it served more than 250 young people across seven counties, and he said the academy has already reached roughly that number again this year.
Some students travel to Montrose, including youth coming from Grand Junction. In other cases, academy instructors travel to communities to conduct workshops or partner with other organizations. Some instruction, particularly music production, can also be done virtually.
Building Common Ground
As the academy grew, Quiroz continued helping other organizations put on events.
Eventually, he began wondering why LFMG wasn’t doing something bigger of its own.
“I love helping other people and I love helping them build these events,” Quiroz said. “But we need to do something for ourselves.”
He had experience to draw from. La Familia Music Group had organized music events and lowrider and car shows in Western Colorado and along the Front Range.
Quiroz also grew up in Telluride, where he said summer meant festivals. He believes Montrose has the venue and location to build something larger of its own.
“Our amphitheater was built to be used,” he said. “There’s so much potential.”
That thinking eventually produced Common Ground, and finding common ground is the purpose Quiroz wants the festival to serve.
“We’re putting people together to find their common ground, whether it’s through music, whether it’s through food, through art, through whatever it is,” he said. “I feel like unity could really get promoted right now.”
The festival is also a fundraiser for LFMG Music Academy and part of a longer-term plan to create a recurring event capable of helping support the nonprofit.
Common Ground will also extend beyond the amphitheater, with downtown partnerships and after-parties intended to bring festival activity into downtown Montrose. Quiroz said that is all part of the goal.
A three-year plan
Admission to Common Ground is free this year.
Quiroz said conversations with community members revealed some lingering skepticism toward previous ticketed festivals and events in Montrose. Rather than immediately asking people to buy tickets to something they’d never experienced, LFMG decided to first show them what Common Ground could be.
“I want to make sure that before I just go out and start ticketing, I want to make sure that people know what they’re getting or what they’re paying for,” he said.
The current plan is a three-year progression.
This year is free, with sponsorships providing much of the financial support and attendees encouraged to donate. Next year, organizers hope to begin selling access to a VIP area while keeping general admission free. By the third year, the goal is to sell both general admission and VIP tickets.
Quiroz acknowledges the academy could take a financial hit in year one.
He views that as part of building something sustainable.
“I look at these things as a business,” he said. “I don’t expect to make all the money year one.”
Eventually, organizers would like to add camping and develop Common Ground into a fully curated three-day festival experience that can draw visitors from beyond Montrose.
For now, LFMG is focused on this weekend.
Common Ground runs from 4 to 10 p.m. Friday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday.
The festival will feature musicians ranging from local students and Western Colorado bands to regional acts, along with live art, food trucks, vendors and a new dining area at the amphitheater.
Saturday’s headliner is The Motet. Quiroz also pointed to Dog Tags, a Front Range group he said has been gaining attention from NPR and the Tiny Desk series, and Grand Junction reggae-rock group Zolopht as acts he’s particularly excited to bring to Montrose.
“Just something new and refreshing that Montrose hasn’t seen before,” Quiroz said.
The lineup also gives LFMG students a chance to perform, including Austine Marie, an academy student who also works as a vocal, guitar and songwriting instructor.
Other students will work alongside professionals on live sound, audiovisual production, stage setup, volunteer logistics and other pieces of running the festival. That’s another important piece of what Quiroz wants the academy to be.
“We are a music academy, but we’re beyond that,” he said.
Students learn how to create art, but the academy also teaches entrepreneurship, publishing, copyright and the business behind creative work, lessons Quiroz learned earlier than most.
“A lot of artists are very talented when it comes to the art, but not very well versed when it comes to the business,” Quiroz said. “I think a lot of the times that’s what lacks for artists.”
More than a decade after starting a record label to protect his own music, he’s now trying to make sure the next generation of young artists understands both sides of the industry while giving them a place to create in the first place.
This weekend, much of that work will spill out of the academy and into Montrose’s biggest venue.
“We want to curate a beautiful experience for the community,” Quiroz said, “so they know, when they do pay for it or whenever we do decide to charge, they know what they’re getting. They know it’s worth it.”
Justin Tubbs is the Montrose Business Times editor. He can be reached by email at justin@montrosebusinesstimes.com or by phone at 970-765-0915 or mobile at 254-246-2260.
