The Top Five Hits of 1947

Written by TJ Dawe

1947 The popular music before rock and roll is largely a mystery to me. I know there was jazz and blues and there were Broadway musicals and Hollywood musicals, and there was Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie, but a look at the top five best selling songs of 1947 (an arbitrarily chosen year) leave me scratching my head. But these were big hits. Here they are.

Number One - Near You, by Francis Craig and his Orchestra:

Number Two - Peg O' My Heart, by the Harmonicats:

Number Three - Heartaches, by Ted Weems and his Orchestra:

Number Four - Linda, by Ray Noble Orchestra & Buddy Clark

Number Five - Smoke, Smoke, Smoke (That Cigarette) by Tex Williams

Songs seemed to have been pretty short back then.

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2 comments

Comment Link Saturday, 24 March 2012 05:05 posted by David MacLeod
The top 10 of any given year is usually not the music of enduring value or interest. And yes, 78 rpm records required short songs (Wikipedia says "Because a 10-inch 78 rpm record could hold about three minutes of sound per side and the 10-inch size was the standard size for popular music, almost all popular recordings were limited to around three minutes in length.")

In the early 1940s, Duke Ellington was at the peak of his genius. Timeless music.
http://youtu.be/Khx57rG4MoI
http://youtu.be/e1VYxzGwLIU

Then there's the music of Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and Thelonious Monk.

Also Igor Stravinsky, Charles Ives, and Sergio Prokovief.

And Frank Sinatra, Jo Stafford, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Prima, and Bing Crosby to name a few.

Stella by Starlight - Sinatra in 1947
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P94vB3mLRzc
Comment Link Saturday, 24 March 2012 07:17 posted by TJ Dawe
78s only being able to hold three minutes of music - interesting example of form dictating content (a certain aspect of it, at least)

It's true - much great stuff from the 40s that wasn't at the top of the charts. When I listen to recordings of jazz or blues legends, I'm usually surprised at how small the audience sounds. Makes me curious to know what music being played now will only grow in recognition over the decades.

But these artists have been forgotten. As far as I know they don't get airplay, their music doesn't get repackaged, remastered and reissued, they aren't known to anyone but fans of that period, and how many of those are there? Their names aren't included in histories of 20th century music. And yet they were very big in their day. Their names meant something. Their music made many people happy. For a while.

It's a good opportunity about impermanence.

And you know, it's not bad music!