LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948 – May 17, 2012), known by the stage name Donna Summer, was an American singer/songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She had a mezzo-soprano vocal range, and was a five-time Grammy Award winner. Summer was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach number one on the U.S. Billboard chart, and she also charted four number-one singles in the United States within a 13-month period.
Bad Girls / Hot Stuff (With Subtitles) - Donna Summer
Summer died on May 17, 2012. The Associated Press reports that she died in the morning at her home in Key West, Florida at age 63 following a battle with cancer.The Bradenton Herald quotes "Sarasota County records" stating that she lived in Englewood, Florida at the time of her death. The reference did not state the place of her death.
Donna Summer - She Works Hard For The Money
LaDonna Gaines was one of seven children born and raised in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood, living on the first floor of a three-decker home. Following her move to Austria in 1971, she met and fell in love with actor Helmuth Sommer while the two were acting in Godspell. In 1973, the couple married and that year Gaines gave birth to her first child, daughter Mimi Sommer. In 1975, the couple divorced.Gaines took her husband's last name, translated to English, as her stage name. After her divorce, she moved into her Los Angeles house with lover Peter Mühldorfer, a respected surrealist painter. As her fame increased, Mühldorfer resented all the press and public attention and it drove a wedge between them. She has stated that he became violent and with the help of Casablanca Records mogul Neil Bogart he was eventually forced to return to Germany after his visa was revoked.
DONNA SUMMER - LAST DANCE
In 1978, while working on the hit track, "Heaven Knows" which featured Brooklyn Dreams member Joe "Bean" Esposito on vocals, Summer met fellow member Bruce Sudano. Within a few months, Summer and Sudano became an item. The couple married on July 16, 1980. A year later, Summer gave birth to another daughter (her first child with Sudano), Brooklyn Sudano, named after Sudano's group (Brooklyn would grow up to star in the hit ABC production My Wife and Kids). A year after that, Summer and Sudano had their second child, Amanda.
Summer had often talked about her early successful years as a period of confusion and anxiety. By mid-1977, struggling with the media's crowning her "the first lady of love", she began suffering from depression and anxiety attacks. Summer wrote in her memoirs that she attempted suicide several times. Her rapid rise to success combined with some serious regrets about mistakes in her personal life. During this time, she self-medicated on prescription medication, resulting in an addiction. Following a nervous breakdown at her home in 1979, Summer went to a local church with her sister Dara and declared herself a born-again Christian. Summer then decided that from then on, she would no longer perform the song that had won her international fame and recognition, "Love to Love You Baby". A quarter of a century later, however, she began performing the song again live. As recently as 2011, she even re-recorded the track, complete with racy sighs and moans, for the "Loverdose" fragrance advertisement by Diesel.
In 1994, Summer and her family moved from Los Angeles to Nashville, where she took time out from show business to focus on painting, a hobby she began in 1985. In 1995, Summer's mother died.
Donna Summer - Bad Girls / Hot Stuff + Speech (Nobel Peace Prize Concert '09) HD
Top Ten Songs
MacArthur Park
Love to love you baby
I Feel Love
She works hard for the money
Last Dance
Hot Stuff
On the Radio
Bad Girls
This time I know its for real
Unconditional love
AWARDS
NAACP Image Award
Three Multi-Platinum albums in the United States
Eleven of her albums went Gold in the United States
Twelve Gold singles
Six American Music Awards
She was the first female African American to receive an MTV Video Music Awards nomination ("Best Female Video" and "Best Choreography" for "She Works Hard For The Money")
1979 – Best R&B Vocal Performance (Female), Last Dance
1980 – Best Rock Vocal Performance (Female), Hot Stuff
1984 – Best Inspirational Performance, He's a Rebel
1985 – Best Inspirational Performance, Forgive Me
1998 – Best Dance Recording, Carry On
Summer placed a Top Forty hit on the Billboard Hot 100 in every year from 1976 ("Love to Love You Baby") to 1984 ("There Goes My Baby").
Summer was the first artist to score three consecutive number-one double albums.
Summer was twice honored by the Dance Music Hall of Fame; once with her induction as a recording artist and again with the induction for her influential single "I Feel Love".
Summer's music career has landed her as the eighth most successful female recording artist in history according to Billboard[citation needed].
Summer's career span of Billboard number-one Disco/Club Play hits spans from 1975's "Love to Love You Baby" through 2010's "To Paris With Love".
DISCS
1974: Lady of the Night
1975: Love to Love You Baby
1976: A Love Trilogy
1976: Four Seasons of Love
1977: I Remember Yesterday
1977: Once Upon a Time
1979: Bad Girls
1980: The Wanderer
1981: I'm a Rainbow
1982: Donna Summer
1983: She Works Hard for the Money
1984: Cats Without Claws
1987: All Systems Go
1989: Another Place and Time
1991: Mistaken Identity
1994: Christmas Spirit
2008: Crayons
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