“When I started to learn that once again another genre that we created was stolen, commodified, and highly commercialized, I thought to myself, what am I doing as a DJ? What am I doing just playing this music? What can I do for my community so that when they come to see me, they have a little bit of history that they can preserve and share? How can I be a seed to everyone else’s consciousness?” This sentiment echoes the deeply personal relationship many listeners have formed with House music since its origins.
Arising in the late 1970s and early 1980s, House music was pioneered by Black and queer DJs who blended disco, gospel, soul, funk, and experimental electronic music into a new sound. Carnegie Hall identifies Chicago, Detroit, and New York City as foundational hubs for the genre. In these geographic locations, House music developed rhythmic traditions rooted in the African diaspora and vocal performances centered on love, spirituality, and celebration.
As House music expands beyond the communities that cultivated it, BRIDGE believes the genre has experienced a familiar pattern within Black music history: the sound gains global recognition while the Black and queer communities responsible for its creation are often pushed to the margins. Part of that shift is reflected in the changing landscape of House music, where BRIDGE has observed increasing visibility of white cisgender men within spaces built around a genre rooted in Black and queer expression. The Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute further contextualizes House music within Black queer history, describing it as a space where communities forged joy, resilience, and chosen family in the face of racism, homophobia, and loss that defined the era.
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When she arrived in New York in 2017, BRIDGE, born Bridget Kyeremateng, identified a need that would eventually shape the foundation of her work: creating spaces for a new generation of Black House DJs and listeners. She knew about the House events that had gone on for years: “I knew about Soul Summit Sundays, Body and Soul, 718 Sessions by Danny Krivit, and Soul in the Horn, but a lot of it was for the older generation.” That eventually led her to create spaces for young Black House DJs that she once struggled to find. Ultimately, this led her to host Honey Bee Vol. 1 in October 2023 and Honey Bee Vol. 2 in March 2025.
The two-part Honey Bee series evolved into what is now known as UPLIFTED. The first official UPLIFTED event was hosted in August 2025 in New York City, where she featured herself, Kilopatrah Jones, CRVM, and Saint James Joy. The event attracted more than 600 attendees, and what really shifted the momentum was a viral video she created in which she challenged the notion that young Black people don’t like House music. The video spread like wildfire across the tri-state area, resulting in people driving all the way from Washington, D.C., just to attend the event. “This year I’ll be throwing UPLIFTED again, but it will be a lot more intimate, in a 150-person space.” BRIDGE explained that while she expects the stages to grow as a result of her career’s momentum, maintaining a sense of connection with her audience remains a priority.
Long before she ascended as a curator of Black House spaces, she was a child discovering House music for the very first time. BRIDGE was raised in a home filled with music; she grew up surrounded by disco, soul, funk, and Ghanaian gospel, also known as highlife. When she was 11 years old, she came across a song titled “Change for Me” by Erro (Eric Roberson), mixed by Joey Negro (Dave Lee). “There was something about the chords, something about Eric’s vocals; there was something about a soulful song over a disco form. I had never heard anything like that,” BRIDGE says. She believes that House music doesn’t make sense for everyone; it’s a genre, an entity that chooses you. “And I felt like at that point in time House music chose me. It found me, and I found it.”
Trinity Battle is a freelance journalist investigating culture, identity, shunned realities, and transitions. Her work examines relationship dynamics, systems of power, and emotional life, with bylines in She’s Single Magazine and ReVamp Magazine, as well as in projects with the African American Male Wellness Agency. She focuses on reinvention, vulnerability, Blackness, and the forces shaping individual and collective evolution.
