Disco diva dead

Disco queen Donna Summer has died, aged 63.

Summer’s family released a statement the music icon had died on Thursday. It’s understood she was battling cancer.

Summer lent her voice to create some of the most defining songs of the ’70s disco days with Love to Love You Baby, I Feel Love and Last Dance. During the pop era of the 1980s she continued on with the hits with hit single, She Works Hard For the Money.

While her music was enormously popular with the gay scene, Summer had a somewhat tumultuous relationship with the community.

In the early 1980s, the born-again Christian was alleged to have made anti-gay comments associated with the AIDS epidemic. She fought the accusations, maintaining she had been badly misquoted.

She later did much work with the Elton John AIDS Foundation.

Summer released her last album, Crayons, in 2008 – her first studio work in 17 years. Speaking to the Star Observer in the same year she revealed she would love to play at Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.

“For Mardi Gras, I would want to do a song they will move to. I would also want everyone to sing with me because, after all, it is a party,” she said.

Music legend Aretha Franklin said she was shocked to hear of Summer’s death.

“In the 70s, she reigned over the disco era and kept the disco jumping. Who will forget “Last Dance.” A fine performer and a very nice person,” Franklin said.