Beat Happening
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
The event–three days of the usual panel discussions, seminars, and schmoozing, followed by three nights of dense performance schedules–is long overdue in coming to Chicago, considering that the city is generally regarded to be the birthplace of house music. House, which has become the foundation for most dance music, started pricking up the world’s ears 15 years ago, and while Flick’s summit is only three years old, the first two were held in San Francisco. “I always wanted to do it in Chicago, but the timing has always been off,” he says. Billboard has a number of other conferences to attend to during the year, and the only time periods open for his have previously been in January–not exactly the optimal time of year to club hop here.
Billboard’s three main showcases–Wednesday at Green Dolphin Street, Thursday at Crobar, and Friday at Vortex–are open to the public (although they’ll be packed with badge-wearing conference attendees), as are various affiliated, semiaffiliated, and unaffiliated after-hours parties. The Billboard programs include a profusion of chart-topping dance divas like Jocelyn Brown, Crystal Waters, Martha Wash, and Jennifer Holliday–Wash and Holliday previously sang together in the Weather Girls–as well as Georgie Porgie, a male vocalist from Chicago. The opening night’s “Clubland Unplugged” show, at Green Dolphin Street, promises to be the highlight, with singers like Byron Stingily, formerly of Chicago house legend Ten City, and Ann Nesby of Sounds of Blackness performing with live bands instead of the usual DAT accompaniment. Local acid jazz favorites Liquid Soul, who are in the midst of a fierce label bidding war, will also perform.
Whatever the actual participation of Chicago artists in sponsored showcases, the city’s dance music heritage is undeniably crucial to the event. Registration is up, and Flick, who is based in New York, attributes the rise in part to the location. “I’ve had calls,” he says, “from people who sort of feel going to Chicago is a pilgrimage.”
