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UPDATE: 12:30pm EST

Donna’s family just released a statement, claiming, they “are at peace celebrating her extraordinary life and her continue legacy”

TMZ has learned Summer died from lung cancer while  several other sources are say that the disco queen believed she contracted it by inhaling toxic particles after the 9/11 attack in New York City.

 

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Our hearts are saddened today as news broke that the Queen of Disco Donna Summer died this morning after a battle with cancer.

According to TMZ, Summer was in Florida at the time of her death. She was 63 years old. 

At the time of her death Summer was focused on trying to finish up an album she had been working on.  
Summer was a five-time Grammy winner, who shot to superstardom in the ’70s with iconic hits like “Last Dance,” “Hot Stuff” and “Bad Girls.”

One of seven children born in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood, Summer was raised in a three-family complex house and as a young girl began singing in the church.

In her teens, she formed several musical groups, including one with her sister and a cousin, emulating the popular Motown girl groups at the time, such as The Supremes and Martha and the Vandellas.

In 1971, Summer moved to Austria where she met and fell in love with actor Helmuth Sommer while the two were acting in Godspell.

In 1973, the couple got married and had their first child, daughter Mimi Sommer.

The couple would later divorce in 1975 and Summer took her husband’s last name, flipping it and making it her own.

In 1978, while working on the hit track, “Heaven Knows” which featured Brooklyn Dreams member Joe “Bean” Esposito on vocals, Summer met fellow member Bruce Sudano.

After two years of dating, the couple married on July 16, 1980 and a year later, Summer gave birth to another daughter named Brooklyn. A year after that, Summer and Sudano had their second child, Amanda.

In 1994, Summer and her family moved from Los Angeles to Nashville where she took time out from show business to focus on painting, a hobby she began in 1985.

Summer lived out her days in Nashville with her husband and is a grandmother of four.

Our thoughts and prayers are with her family. Music lost a true legend today.