1970s Disco

Like all musical genres, it is hard to point out a single point of development of disco, as many characteristics and elements of disco could be found in earlier tracks. However many people agree that disco had truly been recognised in 1973 and just got more and more popular throughout the decade. Disco had many influences like soul, funk, salsa, Latin music and motown. Disco had been heavily influenced by funk music. Orchestral instruments such as Brass, strings and woodwind would take the lead melody, unlike Progressive rock and punk where the line up doesn’t include more than guitars, keyboards, bass and drums. Funk and Disco are very upbeat and are composed to make you dance and move around and party.

The two main cities involved in the development of disco music were New York and Philadelphia. The Philly sound was a style of soul music which included lush instrumental arrangements, often including sweeping strings and very jazz influenced. The Philly sound laid out the groundwork for disco. The disco sound was to some extent shaped by the American producer, Tom Moulton. He wanted to extend the enjoyment in music, so he created a mix tape of all of the best parts of dance songs. This was very important for the technology side of music as well as the creation of disco. In 1977, Giorgio Moroder became responsible for a huge development in disco. Giorgio helped write and produce the song “I feel love” by Donna summers. This song became the first well-known disco hit to have a completely synthesized backing track. This song pushed the boundaries of Disco and all music and even today the song is still considered to have been well ahead of its time.



The main characteristics of disco were the off-beat hi hat, 4 to the flour drum. The bass normally played a heavily syncopated bass line. There was often reverberated- vocals and lots of effects on many of the instruments. The guitars usually played “chicken scratch” rhythm and usually used a lot of wah which is common in funk and soul. The orchestra would usually play small phrases and themes in-between verses.



The production of disco is very professional and very costly unlike the raw sound and DIY attitude of punk rock. Production was expensive because each disco track usually included an average pop line-up, several percussion instruments, a string section, a brass section and a variety of “classical” solo instruments.

The lyrical content and the attitude of disco were mainly revolved around dancing and partying. For example, the movie Saturday night fever was about dancing and the whole sound track was full of disco tracks from important disco bands like “Bee Gees, kool & the gang and Tavares”

Another good example of disco songs which sing about dancing and having a good time is “sly & the family stone” with their hit “dance to the music”.



The image of disco reflected the attitude of the music. They wore bright, psychedelic clothes which give of a sense of going out, partying and having a good time. They wore sparkling and fancy clothes which give off the attitude that they wanted to go out and party all night. The afro was a big part of the image in disco mainly because allot of artists in disco were African American and that was their usual hair style. Here are a few pictures which show the style and image of disco.






Disco had a major influence on dance music. Dance music depends a lot on synthesises and computer software. Disco started introducing all of this technology towards the end of the 70s. Dance music also includes four to the floor, and rasping hi hat drums, lots of effects used on the vocals including reverberation and echo. All these Characteristics can be directly traced back to disco music in the 70s.
This track shows the offbeat hi hat and the four to the floor drum beat which was made popular by disco.



Disco was seen as white man’s music even though many of the artists were black. This theory led to the creation of hip hop. Young black men started to rebel against the disco movement and created a music genre of their own. In the 80s disco seemed to disappear and was forced out by punk rock and hip hop and other genres. Although there may be isn’t many disco artists around now but we can definitely see the impact that disco had made on the music today.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1K7fL5s_1ac

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http://www.ultimatepartyshop.com/shopimages/products/normal/22170%20disco%20whites.jpg

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/observermusic/bee%20gees%20GD5791397

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkP5roFukKY


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHWeuQyFouo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFox61M_0Fw