Throwing back to the week of September 26, 1976, we find two splendid only-in-the-70s tracks atop the Billboard Hot 100: Wild Cherry’s ‘Play That Funky Music‘ and England Dan and John Ford Coley’s ‘I’d Really Love to See You Tonight.’

As both have been featured already, that brings us to #3, Walter Murphy’s disco take on one of the world’s best-known classical pieces: ‘A Fifth of Beethoven.’

Composer Murphy was interested in classical crossovers with pop music, and channeled that interest into his own work. He used this track, which funked up Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, to land a record deal. His debut album, also titled A Fifth of Beethoven included some traditional vocal pop as well as disco-fied updates of work by Chopin and Tchaikovsky.

But it was the title track that captured the public’s attention, rising to #1 on the Hot 100 for a single week. A year later, it was licensed for inclusion on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, which is where I first heard it.

The song was initially credited to Walter Murphy and the Big Apple Band because Murphy’s label believed it would be better received if listeners believed it was by a group. They ran into a problem when they discovered another Big Apple Band already existed, and eventually credited Murphy as a soloist.

That original Big Apple Band, incidentally, changed its name and became the classic Nile Rodgers disco outfit Chic.

Old songs. Great memories.
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