Raising the roof in Chicago

“In Chicago, we think of ‘house’ as both a culture and a genre, but it’s fundamentally a kind of electronic music.the term ‘house’ comes from Warehouse, a Chicago club that was popular in the late 1970s and ’80s, where resident DJ Frankie Knuckles was a pioneer of the genre. An old record store in the city called Importes, Etc started its own ‘Warehouse’ section and it grew from there.

Today, house music is thriving in the city, and we have a tonne of spots to experience it any night of the week. One great place is Smartbar, which has been around since the early ’80s.you can expect total immersion and total joy – you’ll go in and be swallowed up by the music.

We have a floating exhibition – Chicago: Home of House – that explores the history of the genre and is opening at Navy Pier on Memorial Day weekend in May this year. There’ll also be special shows and events to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the first house record (Jesse Saunders’ ‘On & On’).

The Chosen Few festival happens in summertime at Jackson Park on the South Side. If you want to just walk around and learn about house music, it’s the perfect place to be. Plus, there’s also Chicago House Music Festival at Millennium Park in June.” DJ Lori Branch is a long-serving house DJ in Chicago, Illinois, who also hosts the Vintage House radio show ONWNUR.