Brief history of dance music

In the mid-60s, US soul singer James Brown developed a new style of music called funk, the songs in the 60s often lasted for ten minutes or more.

James Brown wanted African Americans to feel proud, so he began writing songs like Say It Loud - I'm Black and I'm Proud, a top-ten crossover hit in 1968 that took funk to the mainstream.

By the early 70s, nightclubs called discos were employing DJs to play dance tracks because it was cheaper than hiring a band.

Most disco artists released their singles in two versions; a short version for the radio and a longer twelve-inch single that was remixed for dance clubs. 

In the early 80s a new style of disco called house developed in the gay clubs of New York and Chicago. Like disco, house songs had catchy melodies with lyrics about going out, having fun or making love. Another new genre of dance music called techno developed in Detroit in the early 80s when club DJs began making electronic dance tracks. They used drum machines to create electronic rhythms and synthesizers with keyboards to add chords and melodies.

A subgenre of techno called trance developed in Europe in the early 90s, and it's still popular today.

Electronic dance music has had a huge influence on pop music over the last 30 years, and pop stars and EDM producers often work together to create dance-pop tracks. EDM artists sometimes invite pop singers and musicians to perform on tracks they've created using the pop-music formula.

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