Donna Summer

According to Billboard magazine, singer Donna Summer was the eighth most successful female recording artist in history, a fact borne out by her incredible run of hits between 1976 and 1984, which included four consecutive No. 1 singles with "MacArthur Park," "Bad Girls," "Hot Stuff" and "No More Tears (Enough is Enough)" with Barbra Streisand. After an unremarkable beginning as a recording artist in Germany, Summer broke into the U.S. market with the eyebrow-raising "Love to Love You Baby," a 17-plus-minute opus of unbridled sexuality built around Summer's ecstatic moans. Producers Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, who oversaw the track, shepherded much of Summer's subsequent efforts, which moved effortlessly from gospel-inspired R&B to pure disco on the Oscar-winning "Last Dance" to proto-electronica on the influential "I Feel Love." Personal problems and a sea change in the music industry capsized Summer's career for much of the 1980s, but she reemerged in the late 1990s with a string of top dance singles, which reaffirmed her status as one of the reigning queens of that genre. Her revival in the new millennium made Summer one of the few stars of the disco era to enjoy chart success in later years, and cemented her status as one of the leading lights of late 20th century popular music.