Wikipedia:Today's featured list/September 13, 2024
In 1961, Billboard magazine launched a chart ranking the top-performing songs in the United States which were considered to be "easy listening". The chart has undergone various name changes and since 1996 has been published under the title Adult Contemporary. Initially, the listing was compiled simply by extracting from the magazine's pop music chart, the Hot 100, those songs which were deemed by the magazine's staff to fit under the Easy Listening banner and ranking them according to their placings on the Hot 100. In 1961, seven different songs topped the Easy Listening chart in 24 issues of the magazine. The number one song on the first Easy Listening chart was "The Boll Weevil Song" by Brook Benton (pictured), which was at number 2 on the Hot 100 that week. The longest-running Easy Listening number one of 1961 was "Big Bad John" by Jimmy Dean, which spent the final ten weeks of the year in the top spot. It was one of three songs to top the Hot 100 as well as the Easy Listening chart during the year, along with "Wooden Heart" by Joe Dowell and "Michael" by the Highwaymen. (Full list...)