Music legend Giorgio Moroder returns to the spotlight

Age is a state of mind. We all know that, but only some of us are really capable of acting accordingly.

After over 30 years, the Italian producer and DJ Giorgio Moroder – credited as a pioneer of synth disco and electronic dance music – is back on the scene with his first studio album.

 

Inspirationally titled “74 is the new 24,” Moroder’s record is expected to be released in Spring 2015, featuring younger and established performers the likes of Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue, Sia, and Charlie XCX.

 

By working with the new generations, the 74-year old DJ feels rejuvenated and instilled with new ideas, as he confessed in many interviews given over the last few months. And this is also because digital technology, which he loves, has now reached such a level of perfecting the sound that it’s not easy to create innovative music.

 

Moroder’s comeback was encouraged by his participation in the 2014 Grammy Award-winning Daft Punk’s disco album Random Access Memories with the autobiographical track Giorgio by Moroder, followed by a number of DJ sets worldwide that combined classics from the ‘70s and ‘80s with new remixes. This sudden and acclaimed resurgence earned him an offer by the American Sony/RCA Records, which “simply couldn’t be renounced”.

 

Nevertheless, Giorgio Moroder was already well known and respected in the industry. Born in South Tyrol, Italy, he moved to Berlin in the mid-1960s and made a name for himself by performing in Italian, Spanish, English, and German. World fame came when he produced some of Donna Summer’s greatest hits in the late 1970s – the golden age of disco music – and started composing for cinema.

 

His work includes award-winning scores for Hollywood legendary movies, such as Scarface, Flashdance (What a Feeling, Oscar in 1983), The Chase, American Gigolo, and Top Gun (Take My Breath Away, Oscar in 1986).

 

Over the years, he has won three Oscars, three Grammy Awards, and four Golden Globes. He was also honored with the title of Commendatore Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana in 2005, as well as with the Lifetime Achievement Award from the World Soundtrack Academy in 2011.

 

Despite distancing himself from music and moving to New York after disco went out of fashion in the late ‘80s, Moroder continued to influence the pop scene and even the 21st century disco revival by being sampled by Lil Wayne and other artists. He also wrote the songs for three different Olympics from 1984 to 2008, and the world hit “Un’Estate Italiana” for the 1990 Soccer World Cup in Italy, probably the best ever composed for a sport competition.

 

Making the most of this second chance in life, which has brought him out of his semi-retirement in Los Angeles, Giorgio Moroder is also planning collaborations with Lady Gaga, major movie productions, as well as with Disney to compose the soundtrack for the latest “Tron” videogame.

 

And to those who wish for him to focus exclusively on retro disco music, he proudly responds that, as a co-founder of this genre, he is entitled to use it and shape it into new, modern sounds that will “pave the way to the future.”