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Dancing Queen

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"Dancing Queen"
Song

"Dancing Queen" is the biggest hit single recorded by Swedish group ABBA, and as such is considered to be their signature song. The song was written by Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus and Stig Anderson, recorded in 1975 for the group's album Arrival, and released as a single in 1976. The song is popular at sporting events.

Although it does not contain many of the most common key characteristics of disco music, it has come to be considered as one of the best examples of this genre.

"Dancing Queen" features a shared lead vocal performance by Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. Its opening keyboard glissando and hummed vocals are one of the most identifiable sections of 1970s pop music.

Like a majority of ABBA songs, "Dancing Queen" is relatively straight-forward; it is about a seventeen year old girl having a good time on a Friday night. She is not fazed by the social and political pressures in her daily life as a teenager on the dancefloor, and all she wants to do is dance, no matter the identity of her dancing partner.

Recording Session

"Dancing Queen" recording sessions began 4th of August 1975; the demo was called 'Boogaloo', and as the sessions progressed, Benny, Björn and their band found inspiration to the dance rhythm in George McCrae's disco classic 'Rock Your Baby', and (the drumming) on Dr. John's 1972 album Gumbo. Agnetha and Anni-Frid recorded the vocals on sessions between 8th and 11th of September, and the track was completed in December that year.

Single Release

"Dancing Queen" was released -with "That's Me" on the flipside- in Britain August 6th 1976 in France and Belgium August 13th, and in Sweden and Scandinavia August 16th. In the US the single was released November 12th, and in Japan it was released in May 1977 (with "Tiger" on the b-side).

Chart Success

"Dancing Queen" spent six weeks at number one in the United Kingdom from August 1976 and became ABBA's only American number-one in April 1977, as well as reaching number one in numerous countries including Sweden, Norway, West Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, Ireland, The Netherlands, Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia), South Africa, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand. It also made the national top twenty in Austria, Canada, France, Finland, Italy, Japan, Spain, and Switzerland. The song was re-released in 1992 in the UK, as Erasure sparked an Abba revival after the success of their "Abba-esque" EP topped the UK charts. The re-issued "Dancing Queen" reached #16 in the UK in September of that year.

In 2000, "Dancing Queen" came fourth in a Channel 4 television poll of The 100 Best Number 1s.[1] In 2001, the song was chosen as number 148 as part of the 365 Songs of the Century list. In 2004 it became ABBA's only song on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, ranked number 171.

Trivia

  • As ABBA started recording sessions with "Dancing Queen", they were still working their way up: none of their singles had reached no.1 in the UK since their Eurovision win with "Waterloo" 15 months earlier, and interest in the group was slowly fading. But then on August 3rd, the video for "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do" was screened on Australian tv -and one week later "Mamma Mia" was screened nationwide -an immense interest for these two singles spawned the Aussie Craze for ABBA. In Britain, the release of "SOS" in September, returned the group to the upper part of the charts again.
  • During the early recording sessions, Benny brought a tape home with the backing track on it and played it to his future wife Anni-Frid, who started crying when listening. Quote: "I found it so beautiful".
  • During work on the lyrics, this part of the verses was scrapped: "Baby, baby, you're out of sight/hey, you're looking allright tonight/when you come to the party/listen to the guys/they've got the look in their eyes...".
  • In recent years it has been covered by such diverse artists as U2, who performed it with original writer Björn Ulvaeus, and Kylie Minogue who performed it at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. Featured in the 1994 film Muriel's Wedding, the song was used as the theme for idealised dreaming with the character Muriel saying early in the film that she wished her life was perfect. She always wished her life was "Dancing Queen".
  • It is featured in the ABBA musical Mamma Mia!.
  • ABBA donned 18th century-inspired costumes when they first performed this song for King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden the night before he was married to Silvia Sommerlath, June 19, 1976.
  • Anni-Frid Lyngstad (former ABBA member) performed this song to commemorate the fiftieth birthday of Queen Silvia. The performance used an a cappella arrangement by The Real Group, which sang back-up for the performance. The arrangement was later released on the group's album "Varför får man inte bara vara som man är".
  • "Dancing Queen" was also featured in a couple of episodes of Winter Sonata, an immensely popular Korean drama series.
  • The song was featured prominently in Spike Lee's 1999 film Summer of Sam. According to Lee, he had to personally contact ABBA and get permission to use the song, as the band was afraid that Lee was going to mock them in the movie. The song was used to ironically underscore an argument between John Leguizamo and Mira Sorvino.
  • Late night talk show host Art Bell occasionally uses "Dancing Queen" as bumper music on his show. Because of this, Phil Hendrie (on his own show) always uses "Dancing Queen" as his bumper music for bits in which he plays Bell.
  • A parody is avilable to this song: Dancing King.

Music sample

Artists who have covered the song

See also

Notes and references

  1. ^ "Channel 4 : The 100 best singles".
Preceded by Billboard Hot 100 number one single
April 9 1977 		Succeeded by
Preceded by UK number one single
October 11 1976 		Succeeded by
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