Though many of her songs and sexual undertones (and overtones), 1975's breakout single "Love to Love You Baby" was greeted with the most controversy. Punctuated by a series of drawn-out moans, the track was actually banned by many stations — including the BBC. Summer took the song out of her performance catalog several years later but began singing it again in the 2000s.
Summer was originally inspired to go into music by listening to Janis Joplin's work with Brother and the Holding Company in 1965. She dropped out of school, becoming lead singer of psychedelic rock group the Crow. The band's brief run ended when they moved from Boston to New York, and Summer took a job performing in the European tour of the musical Hair.
Unlike many of her pop contemporaries, Summer wrote and composed much of her own music. After collaborating on "Love to Love You Baby," she took creative control most of her work, writing alongside longtime partners Pete Bellotte and Giorgio Moroder.
Going out in a blaze of glory, Summer released her final disco effort, the prostitution-themed album Bad Girls, in 1978. It became the best-selling album of Summer's recording career, selling 4 million copies worldwide, driven by "Hot Stuff" and the title track.
Like many stars of the 1970s, Summer saw her musical career take a dip when disco lost popularity. In the '80s, her sound moved more towards the popular New Wave and rock sounds, but the albums lacked the commercial success of her previous efforts.
Summer admitted to suffering a nervous breakdown at her home in 1979. She attended a local church service with her sister Dara and started identifying as a born again Christian — one of the reasons why she stopped performing some of her racier hits.
A gay icon for her disco, Summer suffered a huge setback with her fan base in the mid-'80s when she was rumored to have called the AIDS epidemic God's punishment for homosexual activity. She denied the remarks, calling them a "a terrible misunderstanding. "I was unknowingly protected by those around me from the bad press and hate letters," she said. "If I have caused you pain, forgive me."
Though mainly a singer, Donna Summer did follow on her stage beginnings with several acting gigs, including two appearances on the '90s sitcom Family Matters. She played the shy aunt to Jaleel White's Steve Urkel, Aunt Oona.
In the nearly four decades since she became a recording star, Summer's music found its way into countless films, television series and other recordings. Her track "I Feel Love," for one, has been sampled by the likes of Madonna, Whitney Houston, Britney Spears, Robbie Williams, David Guetta and Moby.
In her later years, Summer continued to perform at special events, singing at the 2010 David Foster and Friends concert in Las Vegas for the record producer and Verve Music Group chairman.