Learn English with "I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)" by Whitney Houston

"I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)" was written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam, the husband-and-wife duo behind the band Boy Meets Girl, and produced by Narada Michael Walden. Walden has said he initially found the demo too country-and-western sounding for Houston, so he reworked the arrangement to give it the driving, danceable groove that became its signature — while Houston herself contributed uncredited work on the lyrics and is credited as the song's vocal arranger.

The song served as the lead single from Houston's second studio album, Whitney, released on 1 June 1987 by Arista Records. The album made history in its own right: it debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, making Houston the first female artist ever to open at the top of that chart, and it then held the position for eleven consecutive weeks.

On the Billboard Hot 100, "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" reached number one on 27 June 1987 and stayed there for two weeks. It was Houston's fourth consecutive chart-topping single, part of an unmatched run that eventually reached seven consecutive number-one hits between 1985 and 1988 — a Guinness World Record that broke the previous record of six shared by the Beatles and the Bee Gees, and one Houston still holds alone.

The song brought Houston the 1988 Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, while Narada Michael Walden won that year's Grammy for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical. Its music video, directed by Brian Grant and choreographed by Arlene Phillips — the same team behind her earlier hit "How Will I Know" — became one of the defining dance-pop videos of the MTV era.

Decades later, the song's reputation has only grown: Billboard has named it among the greatest pop songs of all time, and its title was borrowed for the 2022 Whitney Houston biopic. In this catalogue, it stands as the pure uptempo dance-pop counterpart to the ballads and mid-tempo tracks around it — American English at full, joyful volume.

If you liked this, we recommend:

• Chandelier — Sia (Australian English, another vocal powerhouse chasing release on the dance floor)
• Stay With Me — Sam Smith (British English, the same gospel-soul roots in a much slower ballad)
• I Want It That Way — Backstreet Boys (American English, the 90s heir to this dance-pop energy)
• Wannabe — Spice Girls (British English, another euphoric 90s pop anthem about wanting connection)