Dance moves at the ready – CHIC are heading to Liverpool and our Echo Arena

Are you ready for the best news this summer? One of the world’s greatest funk and disco bands are heading for Liverpool for a very special gig at our Echo Arena and we already have the dance moves ready!

Liverpool Music Week have announced that funk legends CHIC feat. NILE RODGERS will headline the 15^th Anniversary Year Opening Night Party of the prestigious Liverpool-based metropolitan music festival on 26 October 2017. This extremely special performance will take place at Echo Arena Liverpool for the most exciting Opening Night Party the festival has seen to date, at one of the city’s biggest venues.

Liverpool Music Week was recently crowned Best Metropolitan Festival at the UK Festival Awards 2016, and the Opening Night Party will be CHIC feat. NILE RODGERS’ first show in the city in over four decades. Among music legends, Rodgers is truly exceptional. He amplifies his legacy as a multi-Grammy-winning composer, producer, arranger and guitarist by constantly traversing new musical terrain and successfully expanding the boundaries of popular music. Commenting on the news, Festival Director Mike Deane said: “It’s been quite the journey since starting Liverpool Music Week as a single venue venture back in 2003, but there’s no doubt that today is our single proudest moment as we announce CHIC & Nile Rodgers as our 2017 headliners. There aren’t many individuals in music who compare to their legendary status, importance, and continued iconic relevance. We are utterly thrilled that both Nile and the band have agreed to join us this year. There really isn’t a live music show quite like CHIC, and we can’t think of anyone better to open this milestone year.”

As the co-founder of CHIC and 2017 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Award winner for Musical Excellence,   Rodgers pioneered a musical language that sparked the advent of hip-hop with “Good Times,” distinguished CHIC as the “most sampled band in history” (The Guardian, 2011), and generated ground-breaking pop hits like “Le Freak,” which was inducted into the 2015 Grammy Hall of Fame.

His career-defining productions for David Bowie (Let’s Dance), Madonna (Like A Virgin), Diana Ross (diana), and Sister Sledge (We Are Family), plus his work with artists like Duran Duran, INXS, Mick Jagger, Grace Jones, Steve Winwood, Peter Gabriel, The B-52s, and Michael Jackson, have sold over 200 million albums and 50 million singles worldwide while his innovative, trendsetting collaborations with Daft Punk, Avicii, Disclosure, and Sam Smith reflect the vanguard of contemporary music.

As a cultural icon and music innovator with more than 200 production credits to his name, Nile Rodgers transcends all styles of music across every generation. Signed to Warner Bros., Rodgers is currently recording It’s About Time, the first new CHIC album in 25 years. “I’ll Be There,” the album’s first single, went to #1 on the Billboard Dance Chart while the accompanying video generated nearly three million views in less than a week. This June, Nile Rodgers (and Bernard Edwards) became the latest inductees of the Songwriters Hall of Fame. In 2015, he produced, performed, and hosted the inaugural FOLD Festival, a two-day, all-star concert presented at Martha Clara Vineyards on Long Island featuring an “eclectic, genre-spanning set” (Rolling Stone). The success of FOLD 2015 inspired Rodgers to expand the brand worldwide and take it to the UK with the three-day FREAK OUT! LET’S DANCE!! LONDON Festival in June 2016. It was the first ever music event at London’s historic Fulham Palace.

In addition to headlining the world’s most prestigious venues, Rodgers’ many endeavours include his roles as Chairman and Founder of the We Are Family Foundation (WAFF), serving on the NARAS Board of Governors, giving keynote talks at events for noted media companies like FremantleMedia and conferences like Google Zeitgeist, scoring music for blockbuster films, writing the critically acclaimed autobiography Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco and Destiny (2011), and distributing soundtracks for popular AAA video games via his national distribution company and record label Sumthing Distribution and Sumthing Else Music Works. “The full scope of Nile Rodgers’ career is still hard to fathom, and it’s not just on-going, it’s in overdrive,” Rolling Stone recently remarked, naming Rodgers one of “the 50 Most Important People in EDM” (2014). Indeed, Rodgers’ unrivalled track record is a mere glimpse of what’s yet to come.

TICKETS ARE PRICED AT £44.50, £50, £61.50 AND GO ON SALE AT 10AM ON THURSDAY 3 AUGUST