In college, Murphy's interests included
rock music, particularly that which was adapted from
classical music, such as "
Joy" (1971) by
Apollo 100 and "
A Lover's Concerto" (1965) by
The Toys. Later, in 1976, while writing a disco song for a commercial, a producer suggested the idea of "updating classical music", which "nobody [has] done lately". He then recorded a demo tape of five songs—three were ordinary pop songs, while the fourth was a
disco rendition of
Beethoven's
Fifth Symphony titled "A Fifth of Beethoven"—mailing it to various record labels in New York City. The response was underwhelming, but "Fifth" caught the interest of
Private Stock Records owner
Larry Uttal. Murphy signed on to Private Stock and recorded the album
A Fifth of Beethoven, containing the title track and first single of the same name. The single was credited to "Walter Murphy & The Big Apple Band" upon encouragement from Private Stock, which believed it would be more successful if credited to a group rather than an individual. However, two days following the record's release, Private Stock discovered the existence of another Big Apple Band (which promptly changed its name to
Chic). The record was later re-released and credited to "The Walter Murphy Band", then simply to "Walter Murphy". The 1998 single "
Enjoy Yourself" by
A+ samples this song. ==Reception==