Danny Tenaglia

The tale of Danny Tenaglia’s love affair with music, and the world’s subsequent romance with him, is one of the critical veins in the body of dance music. He is every dancer’s secret discovery; a random purchase at the record store, a reluctant night out that unexpectedly turned magic. Explosive success came not behind a major label release, or a world tour, or a radio hit remix. It happened when enough people had the private Tenaglia experience for themselves.

The momentum started building in early ‘70s New York, when a barely 10-year-old Danny first got the feel of vinyl in his hands. It was 1979 when he discovered legendary nightclub Paradise Garage, where DJ Larry Levan’s rich, genre-less blend of music seemed to mirror his own “no boundaries” policy. It was here where Danny found the club model he would one day emulate.

Danny left New York in 1985 and launched a successful DJing career in Miami as a resident at Cheers nightclub. There he schooled the locals in classic New York and Chicago house, but five years later he returned home, tired of only playing other people’s music. He started to assemble an impressive roster of remixes, including Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy”, Jamiroquai’s “Emergency on Planet Earth”, and Madonna’s “Human Nature”. But his first epic was The Daou’s “Surrender Yourself”. With the kick in the bass and the underlying rhythm as the foundation, Tenaglia blanketed Vanessa Daou’s wispy vocal with grand, thick chords, a combination of classic groove and modern club-ready depth that was, at the time, entirely new. The title of his 1995 debut artist album on New York’s Tribal Records described it perfectly, Hard & Soul.

In 1996, after a brief stint at New York superclub Roxy, Danny landed a Saturday night residency at Twilo, a position that upped his profile but didn’t satisfy his expanding artistry as a DJ and producer. This period produced solid remixes like Grace’s “Not Over Yet” and Janet Jackson’s “The Pleasure Principle”, but by the time he moved to Tunnel in 1998, Danny had already created “Elements,” an instant classic that caused the dance scene’s collective jaw to drop. A trio of label compilations, Mix This Pussy and Can Your Pussy Do The Dog? for Tribal, and Gag Me With A Tune for Maxi, were the first Tenaglia sets clued-in clubbers could take home to dissect.

Although, the release of his first installment in the UK-based Global Underground series of DJ mixes ion 2000, titled Athens, lit the international fire. Athens (meant to reflect the set he played at the Greek capital’s club King Size) remains one of the darkest, strangest, sexiest sets ever released, and its tame cover photo of a gentle-looking man in a Yankee cap just didn’t seem to fit. DJ dates across Europe dispelled the mystery and started the spread of the infectious Tenaglia fever.

The world caught up to Tenaglia in 2000. His annual party during Miami’s Winter Music Conference outgrew its home at the cramped Groovejet and moved to just-opened superclub Space. DJ giants like Carl Cox danced on top of the speakers with the Deep Dish boys, Fatboy Slim mingled on the patio, and for a day the ego inherent to DJ culture evaporated Tenaglia was hailed as the undisputed king, the “DJ’s DJ.” His roof-raising revamp of Green Velvet’s “Flash” won “Best Remix” at the UK’s Muzik Awards, where he was also awarded the “Best International DJ” prize.

In the two years that followed, Tenaglia released another Global Underground installment (London), toured the world, took the party island of Ibiza by storm, got nominated for a Grammy for his remix of Depeche Mode’s “I Feel Loved,” also nominated for Best Dance Song), returned to Twilo for two special gigs – a President’s Day marathon with Carl Cox that shattered all its attendance records, and the club’s sixth anniversary party with John Digweed, which turned out to be even more meaningful than it seemed at the time as Twilo was shut down permanently a week later. Also graced the cover of every major dance music magazine and won a Dancestar Lifetime Achievement award.

In 2003, Danny came full circle with the release of Choice: A Collection Of Classics, a two-CD mixed compilation that let him pay direct tribute to many of the artists who had influenced his sound and style. He also opened another Space during Winter Music Conference (the new location down the block), and took another Dancestar award, this time ‘Best Party’ for “Be Yourself.”

Since then Danny has remained prolific in the clubs and has graced the decks in all the big rooms in NYC including Avalon, Crobar, Pacha NYC, Roxy and Webster Hall. Now after a long studio silence, Danny re-emerges in 2008 with his newest single on Tommy Boy Records, “The Space Dance”, named in honor of his first weekly residency at renowned global clubbing institution Space Ibiza to begin in July 2008.

And as in every year since his DJ odyssey began, all across the globe, from his hometown of New York City to Acapulco to Tokyo, more people experienced their first night with Danny Tenaglia, that clubber rite-of-passage which all bet that  forever changes how you listen to music, go out to nightclubs, and think about DJs.