Crayons [Digipak] (CD - 2008)

Personnel: Donna Summer (vocals, background vocals); Robert "Crit" Castillo (guitar); Angelo Petrucci (acoustic guitar); Tom Hemby (electric guitar, steel guitar, harmonica); Miri Ben-Ari (violin); Fred Kron (keyboards, bass synthesizer, programming); Sebastian Arocha Morton (keyboards, Moog synthesizer, programming); Jamie Houston (percussion, programming, background vocals); Davey Warf Rat Chegwidden, Iki Levy (percussion); Lester Mendez, Toby Gad (programming); Jakob Petren, Nathan DiGesare (keyboard programming); Josue Sejour, Jenny Berggren, Mary Gaines-Bernard, Bruce Sudano (background vocals).

Audio Mixers: Manny Marroquin; Jamie Houston; John Jaszcz; Serban Ghenea; Toby Gad; Brian Malouf.

Recording information: Chalice Studio, Los Angeles, CA; Criteria Studio, Miami, FL; DY Studios, Venice, CA; Echo Studios; Henson Recording Studios, Hollywood, CA; Hit Factory, Miami, FL; Paradise; ROCAsound Studios, Burbank, CAScrimshaw Studio, Nashvil; Strawberrybee Studios, New York, NY; Studio City Sound, Los Angeles, CA; The Village Recording Studios, Los Angeles, CA; WEstlake Studios, Los Angeles, CA.

Photographer: Michael Brandt.

Arrangers: J.R. Rotem; Toby Gad.

Preeminent pop diva Donna Summer returned with CRAYONS in 2008, 17 years after her last studio album, and some 30 years after her tenure as the reigning queen of disco. Always a flexible, powerhouse vocalist, Summer sounds as good as ever on CRAYONS, offering up her patented combination of smooth sultriness and gospel punch.

But the effort is no mere rehash of Summer's glory days. The old dance-pop vibe is still paramount, but the sensibility is contemporary, drawing on the sounds of 21st-century club music with strains of hip-hop, Caribbean sounds, techno, and Euro-pop, as well as adult contemporary balladry, all of it beautifully bound together by Summer's still inimitable style. minimize