The Library of Congress is Throwing a Disco Party

Grab your sequin dresses and your three-piece suits: it's time to get your Saturday Night Fever on in the name of history. As the Washington Post reports, the Library of Congress will be hosting a disco dance party in the Jefferson Building on Saturday, May 6, as the grand finale to a month-long "Bibliodiscotheque" event series celebrating the disco era.

The event will feature a performance by Gloria Gaynor, the vocal powerhouse behind disco anthem "I Will Survive." Last year, the single was inducted into the National Recording Registry, a collection of sound recordings considered "culturally, historically, or aesthetically important, and/or inform or reflect life in the United States" and kept at the Library of Congress. (Other recordings in the archive come from the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., Tupac, and Nirvana.)

"Bibliodiscotheque" kicks off April 12, and will feature a series of film screenings, lectures, and other events celebrating the influence of disco on popular culture. Highlights on the schedule include a screening of a live performance from Donna Summer (April 14), a screening of house-music documentary Pump Up the Volume (April 19), and a 40th-anniversary screening of foundational disco feature film Saturday Night Fever (April 27). The day of the dance party, there will also be a demonstration on making disco balls.

The series is the first time the library has dedicated this level of programming to a genre of music, a public affairs assistant told the Post. Carla Hayden, a librarian of Congress, added: "The disco era has left a lasting mark on our culture. The music, the clothes, those fantastic disco balls—they are a part of Americana that new generations are still discovering and embracing."

All events in the "Bibliotheque" series are free and open to the public. Tickets for each event go on sale Thursday, March 30 at 10 AM.