Donna Summer

Released: August 28, 1978

Songwriter: Alan Bergman Marilyn Bergman Marvin Hamlisch

Producer: Giorgio Moroder Pete Bellotte

Spoken:
Well you ladies out there
You know what I'm
I'm talkin' 'bout ya
But you wanna know something?
Did you ever try to remember or
Or just place up a memory in your mind
And it always seems so far away
So hard to find

Memories
Light the corners of my mind
Misty water-color memories
Of the way we were

Scattered pictures
Of the smiles we left behind
Smiles we gave to one another
(oh yesterday) for the way we were

Can it be that it was all so simple then
Or has time rewritten every line
If we had the change to do it all again

Spoken:
Tell me, how many of you would live your lives again
I would too
You girls?

Memories
May be beautiful and yet
What's too painful to remember
We simply choose to forget
And so it's the laughter
We will remember
Whenever we remember

The way we were
The way we were
Whoaaahhhh

As the unquestioned queen of disco, the one and only Donna Summer lit up the late 70s and 80s with flashy, exuberant vocals and automatic earworms. Born LaDonna Adrian Gaines on Dec. 31, 1948, Summer moved to Germany after being cast in a Munich production of Hair. There, she happened to meet Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, and the trio conglomerated to form a dynamic music team. With Moroder, Summer forged together her first album, The Hostage, which reached moderate success in Northern Europe. Summer’s big break, however, would come later with the release of 1975’s sexual “Love to Love You Baby”, which became one of disco’s first mainstream hits and reached #2 on the Billboard Charts.

1977 came around with the concept album I Remember Yesterday, which featured the Top 10 single “I Feel Love”. The next year, Summer hit the silver screen with the movie Thank God It’s Friday, whose soundtrack featured one of her own the iconic “Last Dance.” This would later become one of the disco legends' signature songs. “Dance” would take home an Academy Award for Best Original Song, a Grammy, and a Golden Globe, and it jumped to a peak of #3 on the charts.

Yet Summer’s illustrious career was far from finished – Summer’s first live album Live and More featured the single “MacArthur Park”, a melting ballad that was a cover of the Jimmy Webb ballad of the same name. “Park” became Summer’s first – and perhaps most memorable – No. 1 hit, and cemented her status as a vocalist as well as a performer. With the track, she became the first female in modern rock history to hold the top spot in both the Hot 100 and the Billboard 200. 1979, though, would really be the peak of her career.

more tracks from the album

Live and More

From the album

Live and More (1978)

Donna Summer popular songs

The Way We WereDonna Summer

Donna Summer

Live and More