"Let the Music Play" is a landmark dance song recorded by Shannon in 1983.
The original version of the record was produced by Mark Liggett and Chris Barbosa. By the early 1980s, the backlash against disco had driven dance music off mainstream radio stations in the US. The rhythmic ingenuity of "Let the Music Play" was largely due to Chris Barbosa, who wrote and arranged the original demo track. Rob Kilgore played all the instruments on this seminal track. It featured a series of keyboard chords and drum patterns produced by gating a Roland TR-808 drum machine. The song reached #1 on the US Dance chart in November 1983 and #8 on the US Singles Chart in February 1984. Some mark this as the beginning of the dance-pop era.
The vocal on the chorus is sung by session guitarist/vocalist, Jimi Tunnell, who was uncredited. Shannon sings the answering line by it is Tunnell who sings the "Let the music play" hook.
The song features melismatic vocals, something that was uncommon at the time and would not become common in pop music again until about 1989 when artists such as Lisa Stansfield started to achieve hits with more inflected and emotional vocals.
"Let the Music Play" was Shannon's only US Top 40 hit. It was ranked 43rd on the 2009 VH1 Special 100 Greatest One-Hit Wonders of the 1980s. This song will appear in Dance Central 3.
/ parrket