Studio albums 17 Compilation albums 32 | Live albums 2 | |
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The discography of American singer and songwriter Donna Summer features seventeen studio albums recorded between 1974 and 2008, two live albums and a large amount of compilation albums and guest appearances.
Contents
Studio albums
Live albums
Main compilations
These compilation albums were issued by the record labels to which Summer was signed at the time of their releases. She had full involvement in the putting together of them and recorded new material for them.
Other official compilations
These compilation albums were also issued by the record labels to which Summer was signed (or had recently left) at the time of their releases. However, some of them were only released in certain countries (particularly if a certain label was used to distribute Summer's work exclusively in that country/those countries) and none contained any new material from Summer (although The Donna Summer Anthology featured two tracks from the then unreleased 1981 I'm A Rainbow album).
Film soundtracks
Label associations
Summer's debut album, Lady of the Night was released only in the Netherlands by Groovy Records. This was followed by her first international release, Love to Love You Baby, issued by Giorgio Moroder's Oasis Records in association with Casablanca Records in the United States and Canada. (At this time Summer would again become based in the United States, having lived in Germany for several years previously.) While Casablanca would become the main label responsible for managing Summer, Groovy continued to distribute her work in the Netherlands and other labels were used to distribute her work in other countries, such as GTO in the United Kingdom, Atlantic in Germany and France, Polar in Sweden and Durium in Italy.
From 1977's Once Upon a Time... album, Casablanca would take over the distribution of Summer's albums in most countries (though her releases in the Netherlands would be issued by Philips and [until 1978 and 1979 respectively] would continue to be issued by Atlantic in Germany and France). As a result, some of her former labels released hits compilation albums in an attempt to cash in on losing her: GTO even scored a Top 5 placing in the United Kingdom with The Greatest Hits of Donna Summer. Summer remained with Casablanca, who helped make her one of the biggest stars in music and "The Queen of Disco" until the end of 1979, when she left due to personal and professional disputes with them and filed a lawsuit against them.
Summer became the first ever artist to be signed to David Geffen's Geffen Records in 1980 and, after refusing to release her second album recorded for them (in 1981), requested that she no longer worked with long-term collaborator Giorgio Moroder, who had produced and co-written the vast majority of her hits in the previous decade. From the following album, (issued in 1982), her Geffen work outside North America would be distributed by Warner Bros. Records, the umbrella company to Geffen.
By 1983, Casablanca had been bought out by PolyGram Records, who informed Summer that she still owed them an album as per her legal settlement with Casablanca. Geffen reportedly refused to release much of her material in the remainder of the decade and, after they refused to release her album Another Place and Time in 1988, Summer left the label. However, Warner Bros. released the record in Europe the following year where it became a success, resulting in Summer being signed to their Atlantic label in North America. She remained signed to Atlantic and Warner Bros. until the early 1990s.
Summer again signed to PolyGram's Mercury label, who released two hits compilation albums, her 1994 Christmas album and the previously unreleased second Geffen album from 1981. By the end of the decade, she was signed to Sony's Epic Records, who released a live album. Her final album, in 2008, was released by Sony's Burgundy Records.
Recording rights
In 1990, Geffen Records was sold to MCA Records, which was owned by alcoholic beverage-maker Seagram and in 1998, PolyGram and its imprints were purchased by Seagram, which merged the company with its MCA Records label and imprints to create the gigantic Universal Music Group. This had the result of Summer's MCA, Oasis, Casablanca, Geffen, and Mercury releases now being owned by one conglomerate, Universal Music. This catalogue of Summer's material stretches from 1971 to 1987 for Universal Music Group. Post 1987, the masters to her recordings released by Geffen/Warner Bros, Atlantic Records, Epic Records and Burgundy Records are part of her personal estate.