Live-music venues worth the trip in Dallas, Texas

A 1950 Dallas ballroom born as Bob Wills’ Ranch House, reopened in 2023 with a restored hall and a backyard stage.

A cavernous Deep Ellum room on Canton Street, restored in 2015 as a large-format hall for major touring shows.

A restored 1942 theater in Oak Cliff, a sharply-curated room spanning roots, jazz, indie, and songwriter bills.

A 1946 movie house on Greenville Avenue turned concert hall, a dependable mid-size Dallas stop with its own restaurant.

A multi-room downtown music hall on the Live Nation circuit, with a main hall plus the smaller Cambridge Room.

A ~700-cap Deep Ellum rock club open since 1990, remembered for a chaotic 1991 Nirvana show and still booking touring bands.

A Deep Ellum honky-tonk dive since 1963, graffiti on the walls and country and roots bands on the little stage.