Fifty years of hits

The first ever ‘hit parade’ was far removed from today’s mix of cloned teen idols and remixed nostalgia. Number One, in the ‘New Musical Express’ chart of November 8, 1952, was ‘Here in My Heart’ by Al Martino, closely followed by Jo Stafford’s ‘You Belong To Me’.

The idea came from the United States, where the first music charts were broadcast in 1935. Chart sales then were based on sales of piano sheet music, but during World War Two ‘Billboard’ magazine compiled a chart based on record sales and radio play – which is still how the United States listings are compiled.
‘Melody Maker’ started carrying a Top Tunes songsheet chart for the UK in 1946 but, with sales of 78rpm records fast outstripping song sheets, ‘New Musical Express’ saw a gap in the market. The paper’s advertising manager, Percy Dickins, compiled that first chart, in November 1952, by phoning a few London record stores. By the early Sixties there were several competing charts, which is why opinion is still divided over whether ‘Please Please Me’ was the first Beatles Number One single. It reached Number One in the ‘NME’ chart, but not the ‘Record Retailer’ chart, which tends to be the source used for chart reference books.

In 1969 the British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) began collecting sales data from 250 record shops on behalf of the BBC and ‘Record Retailer’ and produced the first industry chart. The BBC’s listing has remained the most authoritative, despite periodic accusations of it being rigged – most noticeably when Rod Stewart mysteriously kept the Sex Pistols’ ‘God Save The Queen’ off the top position during Silver Jubilee Week in 1977.