2. Disco
• The term “disco” was first used in
post-World War II France when clubs
began playing recorded dance music
rather than using live bands.
• During the sixties such clubs were
called discothèques.

3. Disco
• Disco music of the seventies began
with the soul styles of Detroit (Motown
Records) and Philadelphia
(Philadelphia International Records)
that became popular in gay and African
American clubs in New York before the
dance craze spread to the rest of the
country.

4. Disco
• The musicians and singers of disco
music did concertize, as have most
other rock musicians, but the essence
of disco lay in the clubs themselves,
where the dancers were the
performers.

5. Disco
• Because the music was intended to be
played from records by disc jockeys,
many disco records had “bpm” (beats
per minute) indications on the labels
so that recordings could be chosen to
easily segue from one to another
without changing the speed of the
beat.

6. Disco
• Many disco records began with a
rhythmically free introduction to allow
the tempo to change from that of the
previous record played and to give
dancers time to get out on the dance
floor.

7. Disco
• Other recordings such as Donna
Summer’s “Love to Love You Baby”
(1975) were longer than singles
normally were, again, to allow dancers
a continuous flow of music.

8. Disco
• Musically, disco was somewhat related
to seventies street funk in that each
beat was strongly accented, although
not always at an even dynamic level.

9. Disco
• Many disco recordings also featured
group backup vocals that created a
party-like atmosphere or used whistles
and other sounds to invite listeners to
join into the festivities and dance.

10. Disco
• The movie Saturday Night Fever (1977)
helped spread the popularity of disco
dancing to a massive mainstream
audience.

11. Disco
• Disco’s steady, pounding beat was an
important influence on music during
the eighties and nineties, particularly
on American new-wave bands such as
Blondie.

12. Disco
• It was also an influence on the
synthesized dance music called techno,
which was still popular in the early
nineties.

13. Disco
• Much of the music sampled or imitated
to provide background for early rap
recordings also came from funk and
disco recordings.

14. Disco
• The widespread use of video screens
throughout former disco clubs has
made the visual images of performers
more important than they were in the
disco era.

15. Disco
• Whether disco dancing returns to the
popularity it experienced in the late
seventies or not, disco music continues
to make its mark on the popular
culture.

16. Disco
• In fact, Kool and the Gang followed
their street funk recording of “Funky
Stuff” with disco hits such as “Ladies’
Night” (1979).

17. Disco
• One of the earliest
important disco singers,
songwriters, arrangers,
and producers was Barry
White (born in 1944),
whose disco records
were made with a forty-
member orchestra he
called the Love
Unlimited Orchestra.

18. Disco
• White was born in Texas, where he
sang and played the organ for his
church.

19. Disco
• In Los Angeles as a teenager, White
became a singer and pianist with a
rhythm and blues group.

20. Disco
• He spent time working as an A&R
(artist and repertory) man at a record
company before 20th Century records
contracted him as a singer.

21. Disco
• After the top ten success of his single
“I’m Gonna Love You Just a Little More
Baby” (1973) he formed his Love
Unlimited Orchestra and made one hit
disco record after another through the
seventies.

22. Disco
• As the popularity of disco waned in the
eighties, White had fewer records
making the pop charts, but he did
continue to record.

23. Disco
• His deep, lush voice made it back onto
the pop charts in 1994 with the album
The Icon Is Love and its hit single
“Practice What You Preach.”

24. Disco
• The movie Saturday Night Fever (1977)
helped spread the popularity of disco
dancing to a massive mainstream
audience.

25. Disco
• The Bee Gees had already had
considerable success on the American
pop charts with such hits as “I’ve Gotta
Get a Message to You” (1968) and
many others, but with the popularity
of Saturday Night Fever and its hit
soundtrack album they had three
number one hits, “How Deep Is Your
Love,” “Stayin’ Alive,” and “Night
Fever,” and enjoyed continuing success
after that.

26. Disco
• Other top forty hits from the Saturday
Night Fever soundtrack were the
Trammps’ “Disco Inferno” and Tavares’
“More Than a Woman.”

27. Disco
• Kool and the Gang, and KC and the
Sunshine Band, also contributed to the
movie soundtrack.