Multiple news outlets have sadly confirmed that disco legend Donna Summer has passed away today at the age of 63.
Sources with TMZ state that Summer was trying to keep the extent of her illness out of the press and that she was even trying to finish up an album she had been working on.
Summer won 5 Grammy awards in her stellar career and is best known for her iconic hits like “Hot Stuff,” “Last Dance” and “Bad Girls.”
Here is her professional bio via the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in which Donna was up for selection:
Raised on gospel music in the church, Boston’s LaDonna Andrea Gaines was performing in the European tour of Hair in the early ’70s, when she decided to settle in Germany. In 1975, she began a long-term association with Munich songwriters-producers Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte. They heard her lyric “love to love you baby” and, at the request of Casablanca Records president Neil Bogart, turned it into a 17-minute opus of orgasmic delight (Donna said she was evoking Marilyn Monroe). The song was Summer’s U.S. chart debut and first of nineteen #1 Dance hits between ’75 and 2008 (second only to Madonna). Summer made chart history in 1978-80, as the only artist who ever had three consecutive double-LPs hit #1: Live And More, Bad Girls and On The Radio. She was also the first female artist with four #1 singles in a 13-month period: “MacArthur Park,” “Hot Stuff,” “Bad Girls” and “No More Tears” (with Barbra Streisand). Her first U.S.-recorded LP, 1982’s self-titled Donna Summer, produced by Quincy Jones, featured Bruce Springsteen, Roy Bittan and many American rockers. “She Works Hard For The Money” kept Donna on top in 1983, followed by the Top 10 “This Time I Know It’s For Real” in ’89. As recently as 2009-2010, she had #1 U.S. Dance Club hits with “I’m A Fire,” “Stamp Your Feet” and “Fame (The Game).” Endless covers and sampling of her music by producers and DJs have kept the five-time Grammy Award-winning Queen Of Disco’s pioneering body of work on the front-line.
R.I.P. Donna. Here’s a clip of Summer at the height of her fame performing “She Works Hard For the Money” on The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson:
Photo: Aug 18th, 2010 – Jeff Daly / WENN.com
