Op 14 november 1952 publiceert het Engelse muziektijdschrift “New Musical Express” de eerste hitparade buiten de VS. Deze eerste “top tien” wordt aangevoerd door Al Martino (foto) met “Here in my heart”, vóór Jo Stafford met “You belong to my heart” en Nat King Cole met “Somewhere along the way”.
In the US, Billboard had been compiling a weekly chart based on record sales since 1940, but in the UK a song’s popularity was measured not by its physical sales, but by sales of the accompanying sheet music.
In 1952, Percy Dickins, one of the founders of the New Musical Express (which later became the NME) decided to produce a chart based on UK record sales. Dickins compiled the chart by telephoning twenty record shops up and down the country every week and tallying up their biggest-selling singles. The first ever Top 12 (which was actually a Top 15 given that sales of the Number 7, Number 8, and Number 11 singles were tied) was published in the New Musical Express on November 14, 1952.
dagelijks iets degelijks 