Thor Baldursson
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Thor Baldursson
Thor Baldursson (born Þórir Baldursson in 1944) is an Icelandic composer, organist, arranger and producer. He is best known for his work with Giorgio Moroder, and records with Donna Summer, Grace Jones and Elton John. The 1978 Disco-funk track Sing Sing by his band Gaz became a sought after sample, its rhythm appearing on a number of hits to this day, giving Baldursson songwriting credits on tracks by Drake (Wu-Tang Forever), Dua Lipa, Kylie Minogue and more. That sample is the foundation block of the Baltimore Club genre of music. Baldursson grew up in Keflavík, close to the US military base that ran the international airport. The American radio broadcasts from the base were a heavy influence on him. His first successes were locally, with his band Savanna Tríó, who released a number of folk records between 1962 and 1967. He moved to Sweden in 1970, and to Germany in 1972. While in Germany he started working with Giorgio Moroder and Pete Belotte, as their arranger, as well ...
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Giorgio Moroder
Giovanni Giorgio Moroder (, ; born 26 April 1940) is an Italian composer, songwriter, and record producer. Dubbed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Father of Disco", Moroder is credited with pioneering euro disco and electronic dance music. His work with synthesizers had a large influence on several music genres such as Hi-NRG, Italo disco, new wave, house and techno music. When in Munich in the 1970s, Moroder started his own record label called Oasis Records, which several years later became a subdivision of Casablanca Records. He is the founder of the former Musicland Studios in Munich, a recording studio used by many artists including the Rolling Stones, Electric Light Orchestra, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Queen (band), Queen and Elton John. He produced singles for Donna Summer during the mid-to-late 1970s disco era, including "Love to Love You Baby (song), Love to Love You Baby", "I Feel Love", "Last Dance (Donna Summer song), Last Dance", "MacArthur Park (song)#Donn ...
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Donna Summer
LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948May 17, 2012), known professionally as Donna Summer, was an American singer and songwriter. She gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s and became known as the " Queen of Disco", while her music gained a global following. Influenced by the counterculture of the 1960s, Summer became the lead singer of a psychedelic rock band named Crow and moved to New York City. In 1968, she joined a German adaptation of the musical ''Hair'' in Munich, where she spent several years living, acting, and singing. There, she met music producers Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, and they went on to record influential disco hits together such as " Love to Love You Baby" and "I Feel Love", marking Summer's breakthrough into international music markets. Summer returned to the United States in 1976, and more hits such as " Last Dance", her version of "MacArthur Park", " Heaven Knows", " Hot Stuff", " Bad Girls", "Dim All the Lights", "No More Tears (E ...
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Grace Jones
Grace Beverly Jones (born 19 May 1948) is a model, singer and actress. Born in Jamaica, she and her family moved to Syracuse, New York, when she was a teenager. Jones began her modelling career in New York state, then in Paris, working for fashion houses such as Yves St. Laurent and Kenzo, and appearing on the covers of ''Elle'' and ''Vogue''. She notably worked with photographers such as Jean-Paul Goude, Helmut Newton, Guy Bourdin, and Hans Feurer, and became known for her distinctive androgynous appearance and bold features. Beginning in 1977, Jones embarked on a music career, securing a record deal with Island Records and initially becoming a high-profile figure of New York City's Studio 54-centered disco scene. In the early 1980s, she moved toward a new wave style that drew on reggae, funk, post-punk, and pop music, frequently collaborating with both the graphic designer Jean-Paul Goude and the musical duo Sly & Robbie. She scored Top 40 entries on the UK Single ...
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Sing Sing (song)
"Sing Sing" is a song by disco-funk band Gaz, a project of keyboardist Thor Baldursson, guitarist Mats Bjoerklund, and producer Jürgen Korduletsch. It appeared on the group's only album, ''Gaz'', and was released as a 12" single in 1978, Salsoul Records catalog number SG206. "Sing Sing" has been sampled by hip hop artists such as Grandmaster Flash, Wu-Tang Clan, Chubb Rock, and Lil Jon. In the early 1990s, it was featured prominently in breakbeat tracks from the Baltimore club genre, where DJs looped and modified it using Ensoniq ASR-10 samplers and Mackie mixers. In the early 2000s it also became a staple of the Jersey club sound. The song was featured on the fourth volume of Street Beat Records' ''Ultimate Breaks and Beats'' collection. In October 2013, Salsoul Records filed a lawsuit against Kylie Minogue and Warner Bros., claiming that Minogue copied the "entire rhythm" of "Sing Sing" in her 2007 song "Speakerphone A speakerphone is a telephone with a microphone and ...
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Wu-Tang Forever (Drake Song)
"Wu-Tang Forever" is a song by Canadian rapper Drake from his third studio album ''Nothing Was the Same'' (2013). The song was released as the album's first promotional single on September 12, 2013. "Wu-Tang Forever" features a significant sample of "It's Yourz" by the Wu-Tang Clan. The song was produced by frequent collaborator Noah "40" Shebib. The song has since peaked at number 52 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 chart. Background On August 30, 2013, Drake first revealed he would have a song featured on the album, produced by 40 and titled "Wu-Tang Forever". On September 12, 2013, Drake released the previously announced "Wu-Tang Forever", as the album's first promotional single along with the pre-order of ''Nothing Was the Same'' on iTunes. The song is a reference to the Wu-Tang Clan and their critically acclaimed double album ''Wu-Tang Forever'' (1997). The track also samples the Clan's song "It's Yourz". Wu-Tang Clan leader RZA said he gave Drake the sample free of charge ...
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Baltimore Club
Baltimore club, also called Bmore club, Bmore house or simply Bmore, is a fusion of breakbeat and house genres. It is often referred to as a blend of hip hop and chopped, staccato house music. It was created in Baltimore, Maryland, United States in the early 1990s by 2 Live Crew's Luther Campbell, Frank Ski, Miss Tony (known as Big Tony after he stopped presenting in drag), Scottie B. and DJ Spen. Baltimore club is based on an 8/4 beat structure, and includes tempos around 130 beats per minute. It combines repetitive, looped vocal snippets similar to trap, bounce, ghetto house and ghettotech. Baltimore club is a sample-based form of breakbeat. Samples used include theme songs from shows like ''Sanford and Son'', ''SpongeBob SquarePants'' and ''Elmo's World''. The instrumental tracks include heavy breakbeats and call and response stanzas similar to those found in the go-go music of Washington, D.C. The most prominent breakbeats sampled include "Sing Sing" by disco band Gaz and "T ...
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Pete Bellotte
Peter John Bellotte (born 28 August 1943)Ancestry.com. England & Wales, Birth Index: 1916–2005 atabase on-line Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008. Original data: General Register Office. England and Wales Civil Registration Indexes. London, England: General Register Office. is an English songwriter, record producer and author most noted for his work in the 1970s with Giorgio Moroder and Donna Summer. Life and career Bellotte was born in Barnet, Hertfordshire which is now part of North London. He learned guitar in his early teens, and joined a local group the Linda Laine and the Sinners as a guitarist, becoming a professional in 1962. They toured all over the UK for two years and in the early 1960s toured in Germany. In Hamburg they encountered another English band, Bluesology, and Bellotte became friends with their keyboard player, Reg Dwight who changed his name later to Elton John.
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Salsoul Orchestra
The Salsoul Orchestra was the backing band of session musicians for many acts on the New York City label Salsoul Records and, under its own name, recorded several hit singles and albums between 1975 and 1982. History The orchestra was formed in 1974 and was disbanded in 1982. Their music featured elements of Philadelphia soul, funk, Latin and disco. The Salsoul Orchestra included up to 50 members and was created and masterminded for Salsoul Records by Philadelphia musician Vincent Montana, Jr. Montana wrote, arranged, conducted, produced and played on all of the orchestra's tracks until 1978, including a gold-selling Christmas album. The Salsoul Orchestra initially consisted of many of the original members of Philadelphia International's MFSB, who had moved to Salsoul as the result of a disagreement with producers Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff over finances. Other members began performing as the Ritchie Family and as John Davis and the Monster Orchestra. Many large disco orc ...
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Icelandic Composers
Icelandic refers to anything of, from, or related to Iceland and may refer to: *Icelandic people *Icelandic language *Icelandic alphabet *Icelandic cuisine See also * Icelander (other) * Icelandic Airlines, a predecessor of Icelandair * Icelandic horse, a breed of domestic horse * Icelandic sheep, a breed of domestic sheep * Icelandic Sheepdog, a breed of domestic dog * Icelandic cattle Icelandic cattle ( is, íslenskur nautgripur ) are a breed of cattle native to Iceland. Cattle were first brought to the island during the Settlement of Iceland a thousand years ago. Icelandic cows are an especially colorful breed with a wide v ..., a breed of cattle * Icelandic chicken, a breed of chicken {{disambig Language and nationality disambiguation pages ...
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1944 Births
Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January 2 – WWII: ** Free France, Free French General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny is appointed to command First Army (France), French Army B, part of the Sixth United States Army Group in North Africa. ** Landing at Saidor: 13,000 US and Australian troops land on Papua New Guinea, in an attempt to cut off a Japanese retreat. * January 8 – WWII: Philippine Commonwealth troops enter the province of Ilocos Sur in northern Luzon and attack Japanese forces. * January 11 ** President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt proposes a Second Bill of Rights for social and economic security, in his State of the Union address. ** The Nazi German administration expands Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp into the larger standalone ''Konzentrationslager Plaszow bei Krakau'' in occupied Poland. * January 12 – WWII: Winston Churchill and Charles de Gaulle begin a 2-day conference in Marrakech ...
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