House Music: A Cultural Revolution | Chicago Stories

House Music: A Cultural Revolution

Chicago’s secret is very much out in the open now: house music DJs headline clubs and festivals from London to Cape Town. But this electronic dance music was born behind closed doors at underground venues. In the early 1980s, a band of mostly Black, gay artists created house music in old warehouses. Led by such DJs as Frankie Knuckles, a group of artists created a mechanical, bass-heavy sound using drum machines and synthesizers. It became the soundtrack of safe spaces that were free from the racism and homophobia of the outside world.

How a Group of Chicago Friends Laid the Foundation for the House Music Movement

DJ Frankie Knuckles performing at a house music party Credit: Frankie Knuckles Foundation

Before house music became a genre pulsing from the speakers of clubs from London to Ibiza to Cape Town, it was a new kind of groove growing in the underground disco club scene in Chicago’s Black and gay communities. It all started with a group of friends who wanted to replicate for Chicagoans the cathartic joy of New York City’s loft parties. They didn’t know they were making history at the time, but they laid the foundation for house music, upon which Frankie Knuckles, the so-called “Godfather of House Music,” would build a new genre that became a safe space for many.... Read more

‘House Music Is Disco’s Revenge’: How Disco Demolition Night at Comiskey Park Drove a Genre Underground

A banner reading “Disco Sucks” is displayed at Comiskey Park on July 12, 1979. Credit: Diane Alexander White

When a radio DJ blew up a pile of disco records at a White Sox game at Comiskey Park as part of a promotional event called “Disco Demolition Night,” an aggressive crowd stormed the field, setting fires and wreaking havoc. It was a backlash against disco music, but many saw it as a violent outpouring of racist and homophobic sentiment.

In the late 1960s and ’70s, disco music was at its peak as a dance music genre. The disco clubs that had emerged in American cities became safe havens for Black, Latino, and gay Americans.

“If these club musics – disco and then house – are about establishing a place of sanctuary, enjoyment, togetherness, youthfulness, all these things, then we shouldn’t be surprised that queer Black people are leading the charge to create that kind of space,” Fredara Hadley, ethnomusicology professor at the Juilliard School, told Chicago Stories. “If queer Black people are safe, then everybody else is going to be safe.”.... Read more

Lori Branch wearing headphones places a record on a turntable

Meet the Heroines of House Music

Lori Branch was one of the first women DJs in the Chicago house music scene. Credit: Lori Branch

When Celeste Alexander DJed in the 1980s, she wore baggy sweatshirts and a baseball cap to conceal the fact that she was a woman.

“I wouldn’t take the hat off and reveal that I was a female until after I had played a few songs and gotten the crowd’s attention by the music. Then I would reveal my gender,” Alexander told Chicago Stories.

She chose that wardrobe because, during her first gig, her presence as a woman DJ was not exactly well received. “My very first paid DJ gig, I got booed. I got booed right out of the DJ booth. I didn’t get two records in. It was basically because I was a girl and…they weren't interested,” she said.

In the early days of house music, it wasn’t always easy for women such as Alexander. Along with Lori Branch, Alexander was among the first women DJs in Chicago’s house music scene.... Read more