Origins of the Disco Queen:
- Donna Summer was born on December 31st 1948, in Boston, Massachusetts. She was born with the name, LaDonna Adrian Gaines to a large family with seven children.
- Donna Summer gained her musical beginnings both through singing in her church choir and doing solo performances in it, and through performing in her local high school musicals.
- Her professional musical career began in New York, when she moved there as a teenager and joined the band “Crow.” The band’s success was short-lived and Summer soon returned back to some of her musical roots by joining the cast of the musical, “Hair.” This work led her to work in many other musicals, mostly german ones, and eventually the soon-to-be Disco Queen moved to Vienna, Austria to continue performing in these musicals and recording music of her own.
- Donna Summer’s earliest Disco songs like “Lady of the Night” first became popular in Europe but eventually would find great success in the United States as well.
The Height of Donna Summer’s Career in Disco:
- At the height of her career in Disco, Donna Summer was and still is one of the world’s best selling artists of all time. With regards to the genre and time period specifically, her singles reached the top spots on the billboard charts for nearly ten consecutive years.
- Donna Summer also reached peak levels of success internationally with her global hit “Love to Love You Baby.” This served as one of her most popular songs of her entire career, and one of the most popular disco songs of all time.
- “Love to Love You Baby” reached number 2 on the United States Billboard top 100 list.
- This song would launch Donna Summer’s career as the Queen of Disco and would place her into worldwide notoriety, acclaim and popularity for her music. Most of the singles released by Summer after the release of this hit and during this period of time were also massive successes across the globe.
- Donna Summer has also received five grammy’s during her career.
The Later Years of Donna Summer:
- Donna Summer remained a very successful recording artist, vocalist, and performer throughout the rest of her life. In fact, two years before her death, Donna Summer recorded a single titled, “To Paris With Love” that went number one on the Billboard top 100 list.
- Donna Summer passed away on May 17th, 2012 in Naples, Florida.
- Even after her death, Donna Summer was postmuthusly inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
