This is a list of Billboard magazine's Top Hot 100 songs of 1964.[1]
1. Billboard (magazine) – Billboard is an American entertainment media brand owned by the Hollywood Reporter-Billboard Media Group, a division of Eldridge Industries. It publishes pieces involving news, video, opinion, reviews, events and it is also known for its music charts, including the Billboard Hot 100 and Billboard 200, tracking the most popular singles and albums in different genres. It also hosts events, owns a publishing firm, and operates several TV shows, Billboard was founded in 1894 by William Donaldson and James Hennegan as a trade publication for bill posters. Donaldson later acquired Hennegens interest in 1900 for $500, in the 1900s, it covered the entertainment industry, such as circuses, fairs and burlesque shows. It also created a service for travelling entertainers. Billboard began focusing more on the industry as the jukebox, phonograph. Many topics it covered were spun-off into different magazines, including Amusement Business in 1961 to cover outdoor entertainment so that it could focus on music. After Donaldson died in 1925, Billboard was passed down to his children and Hennegans children, until it was sold to investors in 1985. The first issue of Billboard was published in Cincinnati, Ohio, on November 1,1894 by William Donaldson, initially, it covered the advertising and bill posting industry and was called Billboard Advertising. At the time, billboards, posters and paper advertisements placed in public spaces were the means of advertising. Donaldson handled editorial and advertising, while Hennegan, who owned Hennegan Printing Co. managed magazine production, the first issues were just eight pages long. The paper had columns like The Bill Room Gossip and The Indefatigable, a department for agricultural fairs was established in 1896. The title was changed to The Billboard in 1897, after a brief departure over editorial differences, Donaldson purchased Hennegans interest in the business in 1900 for $500, to save it from bankruptcy. That May, Donaldson changed it from a monthly to a paper with a greater emphasis on breaking news. He improved editorial quality and opened new offices in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, London and he also re-focused the magazine on outdoor entertainment like fairs, carnivals, circuses, vaudeville and burlesque shows. A section devoted to circuses was introduced in 1900, followed by more prominent coverage of events in 1901. Billboard also covered topics including regulation, a lack of professionalism, economics and it had a stage gossip column covering the private lives of entertainers, a tent show section covering traveling shows and a sub-section called Freaks to order. According to The Seattle Times, Donaldson also published articles attacking censorship, praising productions exhibiting good taste
2. Billboard Hot 100 – The Billboard Hot 100 is the music industry standard record chart in the United States for singles, published weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on sales, radio play and online streaming, the weekly sales period was originally Monday to Sunday, when Nielsen started tracking sales in 1991, but was changed to Friday to Thursday in July 2015. Radio airplay, which, unlike sales figures and streaming data, is available on a real-time basis. A new chart is compiled and officially released to the public by Billboard on Tuesdays, as of the issue for the week ending on April 15,2017, the Hot 100 has had 1,061 different number one hits. The current number one song is Shape of You by Ed Sheeran, prior to 1955, Billboard did not have a unified, all-encompassing popularity chart, instead measuring songs by individual metrics. At the start of the era in 1955, three such charts existed, Best Sellers in Stores was the first Billboard chart, established in 1936. This chart ranked the biggest selling singles in retail stores, as reported by merchants surveyed throughout the country, Most Played by Jockeys was Billboards original airplay chart. It ranked the most played songs on United States radio stations, as reported by radio disc jockeys, Most Played in Jukeboxes ranked the most played songs in jukeboxes across the United States. On the week ending November 12,1955, Billboard published The Top 100 for the first time, the Top 100 combined all aspects of a singles performance, based on a point system that typically gave sales more weight than radio airplay. The Best Sellers In Stores, Most Played by Jockeys and Most Played in Jukeboxes charts continued to be published concurrently with the new Top 100 chart. The week ending July 28,1958 was the publication of the Most Played By Jockeys and Top 100 charts. On August 4,1958, Billboard premiered one main all-genre singles chart, the Hot 100 quickly became the industry standard and Billboard discontinued the Best Sellers In Stores chart on October 13,1958. The Billboard Hot 100 is still the standard by which a songs popularity is measured in the United States, the Hot 100 is ranked by radio airplay audience impressions as measured by Nielsen BDS, sales data compiled by Nielsen Soundscan and streaming activity provided by online music sources. There are several component charts that contribute to the calculation of the Hot 100. Charts are ranked by number of gross audience impressions, computed by cross-referencing exact times of radio airplay with Arbitron listener data. Hot Singles Sales, the top selling singles compiled from a sample of retail store, mass merchant and internet sales reports collected, compiled. The chart is released weekly and measures sales of commercial singles. With the decline in sales of singles in the US
3. 1964 in music – This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1964. January 1 – Top of the Pops is broadcast for the first time, January 3 – Footage of the Beatles performing a concert in Bournemouth, England is shown on The Jack Paar Show. January 13 – Bob Dylans The Times They Are a-Changin is released on Columbia Records, January 15 – Vee Jay Records files a lawsuit against Capitol Records and Swan Records over manufacturing and distribution rights to Beatles albums. On April 9, Capitol Records is granted an injunction restraining Vee Jay Records from further manufacturing, distributing or advertising recordings by the Beatles, January 18 – The Beatles appear on the Billboard magazine charts for the first time. January 25 - The late John F. Kennedy becomes the first President credited with a Top 10 album after Dickie Goodman released John F. Kennedy, The Presidential Years 1960-1963. The following week a second album, credited to the late President, February 1 – Indiana Governor Matthew E. Welsh declares the song Louie Louie by The Kingsmen pornographic. He requests that the Indiana Broadcasters Association ban the record, Governor Welsh claimed that hearing the song made his ears tingle. Publisher Max Firetag offers $1,000 to anyone that can find anything suggestive in the songs lyrics, February 7 – The Beatles arrive in the United States and are greeted by thousands of screaming fans at New Yorks Kennedy Airport. February 9 – The Beatles perform on The Ed Sullivan Show, February 12 – Anna Moffo collapses onstage at Covent Garden in the first act of Rigoletto, and her part is taken over, after a delay of 45 minutes, by Welsh soprano Elizabeth Vaughan. February 16 – The Beatles appear on The Ed Sullivan Show, February 22 – Plácido Domingo makes his international breakthrough at the première of Ginasteras Don Rodrigo in New York City. February 23 The Beatles appear on The Ed Sullivan Show, march 6 – Elvis Presleys 14th motion picture, Kissin Cousins is released to theaters. March 14 – Billboard Magazine reports that sales of Beatles records make up 60% of the singles market. March 16 – Disc jockey Alan Freed is charged with tax evasion, march 21 – Italy wins the 9th Eurovision Song Contest, held in the Tivoli Concert Hall, Copenhagen, with the song Non ho letà, sung by 16-year-old Gigliola Cinquetti. March 24 – John Lennons first book, In His Own Write is published, march 27 – The Beatles occupy the top six spots on the Australian pop chart. March 28 – Wax likenesses of The Beatles are put on display in Londons Madame Tussauds Wax Museum, the Beatles are the first pop stars to be displayed at the museum. April – Drummer Keith Moon joins The Who, April 4 – The Beatles occupy all five top positions on Billboards Hot 100 with their singles Cant Buy Me Love, Twist and Shout, She Loves You, I Want to Hold Your Hand, and Please Please Me. April 11 – The Beatles hold 14 positions on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, previously, the highest number of concurrent singles by one artist on the Hot 100 was nine by Elvis Presley, December 19,1956. April 16 – The Rolling Stones release their eponymous début album, may 2 – In the United States, The Beatles Second Album climbs to the #1 spot on the LP charts in only its second week of release
4. I Want to Hold Your Hand – I Want to Hold Your Hand is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and recorded in October 1963, taking two weeks to dislodge its predecessor, I Want to Hold Your Hand stayed at number one for five weeks and remained in the UK top 50 for 21 weeks in total. It was also the groups first American number one, entering the Billboard Hot 100 chart on 18 January 1964 at number 45 and starting the British invasion of the American music industry. By 1 February it held the spot, and stayed there for seven weeks before being replaced by She Loves You. It remained on the Billboard chart for 15 weeks, I Want to Hold Your Hand became the Beatles best-selling single worldwide. In 2013, Billboard magazine named it the 44th biggest hit of all-time on the Billboard Hot 100 charts. Capitol Records rejection of the recordings in the USA was now Brian Epstein’s main concern and encouraged Lennon. This location briefly became Lennon and McCartneys new writing base, taking over from McCartney’s Forthlin Road home in Liverpool. Margaret Asher taught the oboe in the small, rather stuffy music room in the basement where Lennon and McCartney sat at the piano, in September 1980, Lennon told Playboy magazine, We wrote a lot of stuff together, one on one, eyeball to eyeball. Like in I Want to Hold Your Hand, I remember when we got the chord that made the song and we were in Jane Ashers house, downstairs in the cellar playing on the piano at the same time. And we had, Oh you-u-u/ got that something, and Paul hits this chord and I turn to him and say, Thats it. In those days, we used to absolutely write like that — both playing into each others noses. In 1994, McCartney agreed with Lennons description of the surrounding the composition of I Want to Hold Your Hand, saying. I Want to Hold Your Hand was very co-written and it was our big number one, the one that would eventually break us in America. The song is in the key of G major and opens on Ill tell you with a D-B, B-D melody note drop, controversy exists over the landmark chord that Lennon stated McCartney hit on the piano while they were composing the song. Marshall considers it is the vi chord. Everett is of the same opinion, pedler claims, however, that more surprising is the melody note drop from B to F# against a III7 chord on understand. Music theorists are divided over whether this chord is a iii, lyrically bland, random phrases were most likely called out and if they fitted the overall sound would stay
5. The Beatles – The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960. With members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, the Beatles built their reputation playing clubs in Liverpool and Hamburg over a three-year period from 1960, with Stuart Sutcliffe initially serving as bass player. The core of Lennon, McCartney and Harrison went through a succession of drummers, including Pete Best, before asking Starr to join them. They acquired the nickname the Fab Four as Beatlemania grew in Britain the next year, from 1965 onwards, the Beatles produced increasingly innovative recordings, including the albums Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles and Abbey Road, after their break-up in 1970, they each enjoyed successful musical careers of varying lengths. McCartney and Starr, the members, remain musically active. Lennon was shot and killed in December 1980, and Harrison died of cancer in November 2001. The Beatles are the band in history, with estimated sales of over 600 million records worldwide. They have had more number-one albums on the British charts and sold more singles in the UK than any other act, according to the RIAA, the Beatles are also the best-selling music artists in the United States, with 178 million certified units. In 2008, the group topped Billboard magazines list of the all-time most successful Hot 100 artists, as of 2016 and they have received ten Grammy Awards, an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score and fifteen Ivor Novello Awards. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 and they were also collectively included in Time magazines compilation of the twentieth centurys 100 most influential people. In March 1957, John Lennon, then aged sixteen, formed a group with several friends from Quarry Bank school. They briefly called themselves the Blackjacks, before changing their name to the Quarrymen after discovering that a local group was already using the other name. Fifteen-year-old Paul McCartney joined as a rhythm guitarist shortly after he, in February 1958, McCartney invited his friend George Harrison to watch the band. The fourteen-year-old auditioned for Lennon, impressing him with his playing, after a month of Harrisons persistence, they enlisted him as their lead guitarist. By January 1959, Lennons Quarry Bank friends had left the group, the three guitarists, billing themselves at least three times as Johnny and the Moondogs, were playing rock and roll whenever they could find a drummer. They used the name until May, when they became the Silver Beetles, before undertaking a tour of Scotland as the backing group for pop singer. By early July, they had changed their name to the Silver Beatles, allan Williams, the Beatles unofficial manager, arranged a residency for them in Hamburg, but lacking a full-time drummer they auditioned and hired Pete Best in mid-August 1960
6. She Loves You – She Loves You is a song written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney and recorded by English rock group the Beatles for release as a single in 1963. It is their single and the best selling single of the 1960s in the United Kingdom. In November 2004, Rolling Stone ranked She Loves You number 64 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. Lennon and McCartney started composing She Loves You on 26 June 1963 after a concert at the Majestic Ballroom in Newcastle upon Tyne during their tour with Roy Orbison and Gerry and the Pacemakers. They began writing the song on the bus, and continued later that night at their hotel in Newcastle. Id planned an answering song where a couple of us would sing she loves you and we decided that was a crummy idea but at least we then had the idea of a song called She Loves You. So we sat in the bedroom for a few hours and wrote it—John and I. It was completed the day at McCartneys family home in Forthlin Road. Like many early Beatles songs, the title of She Loves You was framed around the use of personal pronouns and its you shes thinking of – And she told me what to say. This idea was attributed by Lennon to McCartney in 1980, It was Pauls idea, instead of singing I love you again and that kind of little detail is still in his work. He will write a story about someone, im more inclined to write about myself. As Lennon later said, We stuck it in everything, McCartney recalls them playing the finished song on acoustic guitars to his father Jim at home immediately after the song was completed, We went into the living room and said Dad, listen to this. And he said Thats very nice son, but theres enough of these Americanisms around, couldnt you sing She loves you, yes, yes, yes. At which point we collapsed in a heap and said No, Dad, I thought, Oh my God, what a lyric. This is going to be one that I do not like, but when they started to sing it—bang, wow, terrific, I was up at the mixer jogging around. The yeah, yeah, yeah refrain proved an immediate, effective, unusually, the song starts with the hook right away, instead of introducing it after a verse or two. She Loves You does not include a bridge, instead using the refrain to join the various verses, the chords tend to change every two measures, and the harmonic scheme is mostly static. The arrangement starts with a two-count of Ringo Starrs drums, the electric instruments are mixed higher than before, especially McCartneys bass, adding to the sense of musical power that the record provides
7. Hello, Dolly! (song) – Hello, Dolly. is the title song of the popular 1964 musical of the same name. Louis Armstrongs version was inducted in the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2001, the music and lyrics were written by Jerry Herman, who also wrote the scores for many other popular musicals including Mame and La Cage aux Folles. Hello, Dolly. was first sung by Carol Channing, who starred as Dolly Gallagher Levi in the original 1964 Broadway cast. In December 1963, at the behest of his manager, Louis Armstrong made a recording of Hello. Hello, Dolly. opened on January 16,1964 at the St. James Theatre in New York City, the same month, Kapp Records released Armstrongs publishing demo as a commercial single. His version reached number one on the U. S, the song also spent nine weeks atop the adult contemporary chart shortly after the opening of the musical. The song also made Armstrong the oldest artist ever to reach #1 on the Hot 100 since its introduction in 1958, billboard ranked the record as the No.3 song of 1964, behind the Beatles I Want to Hold Your Hand and She Loves You. In 1965, Armstrong performed the song on a German variety show with musician, Hello, Dolly. won the Grammy Award for Song of the Year in 1965, and Armstrong received a Grammy for Best Vocal Performance, Male. Louis Armstrong also performed the song in the popular 1969 film Hello, in 1984, Carol Channing had appeared on Sesame Street and sang a parody of the song called Hello, Sammy. A love song being sung by Carol to a known as Sammy the Snake. Carol, in this segment, serenades Sammy telling him just how much she loves and adores him while Sammy coils himself around Carols arms. They are soon joined by 4 giant swaying letter Ss wearing top hats, Carol ends the song by telling Sammy just how much shed miss him and the way he hisses if they ever parted. Carols song includes lyrics such as, So. turn on your charm, Sammy/Coil yourself around my arm, Sammy/Sammy the Snake, Ill stake a claim on you
8. Louis Armstrong – Louis Armstrong, nicknamed Satchmo or Satch, was an American trumpeter, composer, singer and occasional actor who was one of the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades, from the 1920s to the 1960s and he was also skilled at scat singing. Armstrong was one of the first truly popular African-American entertainers to cross over and he rarely publicly politicized his race, often to the dismay of fellow African Americans, but took a well-publicized stand for desegregation in the Little Rock crisis. His artistry and personality allowed him socially acceptable access to the upper echelons of American society which were restricted for black men of his era. Armstrong often stated that he was born on July 4,1900, although he died in 1971, it was not until the mid-1980s that his true birth date, August 4,1901, was discovered by the researcher Tad Jones through the examination of baptismal records. Armstrong was born into a family in New Orleans, Louisiana. He spent his youth in poverty, in a neighborhood known as the Battlefield. His father, William Armstrong, abandoned the family when Louis was an infant and his mother, Mary Mayann Albert, then left Louis and his younger sister, Beatrice Armstrong Collins, in the care of his grandmother, Josephine Armstrong, and at times his uncle Isaac. At five, he moved back to live with his mother, her relatives and he attended the Fisk School for Boys, where he most likely had early exposure to music. He hung out in dance halls close to home, where he observed everything from licentious dancing to the quadrille, after dropping out of the Fisk School at age eleven, Armstrong joined a quartet of boys who sang in the streets for money. He also started to get into trouble, Cornet player Bunk Johnson said he taught Armstrong to play by ear at Dago Tonys Tonk in New Orleans, although in his later years Armstrong gave the credit to Oliver. It has given me something to live for and he also worked for a Lithuanian-Jewish immigrant family, the Karnofskys, who had a junk-hauling business and gave him odd jobs. They took him in and treated him like family, knowing he lived without a father and he later wrote a memoir of his relationship with the Karnofskys, Louis Armstrong + the Jewish Family in New Orleans, La. the Year of 1907. Armstrong wore a Star of David pendant for the rest of his life and wrote about what he learned from them, how to live—real life, professor Peter Davis instilled discipline in and provided musical training to the otherwise self-taught Armstrong. Eventually, Davis made Armstrong the band leader, the home band played around New Orleans and the thirteen-year-old Louis began to draw attention by his cornet playing, starting him on a musical career. At fourteen he was released from the home, living again with his father and new stepmother, Gertrude, Armstrong got his first dance hall job at Henry Ponces, where Black Benny became his protector and guide. He hauled coal by day and played his cornet at night, later, he played in brass bands and riverboats of New Orleans, and began traveling with the well-regarded band of Fate Marable, which toured on a steamboat up and down the Mississippi River. He described his time with Marable as going to the University, in 1919, Joe Oliver decided to go north and resigned his position in Kid Orys band, Armstrong replaced him
9. Oh, Pretty Woman – Oh, Pretty Woman is a song recorded by Roy Orbison, written by Orbison and Bill Dees. It was released as a single in August 1964 on Monument Records and it was also Orbisons third single to top the UK Singles Chart. The record ultimately sold seven million copies and marked the point in Orbisons career. Within months of its release, in October 1964, the single was certified gold by the RIAA, at the years end, Billboard ranked it the number four song of 1964. The lyrics tell the story of a man who sees a pretty woman walking by and he yearns for her and wonders if, as beautiful as she is, she might be lonely like he is. At the last minute, she turns back and joins him, the title was inspired by Orbisons wife, Claudette, interrupting a conversation to announce she was going out. When Orbison asked if she had enough cash, his co-writer Bill Dees interjected, Orbisons recording of the song, which used four guitars, was produced by Fred Foster. In 1999, the song was honored with a Grammy Hall of Fame Award and was named one of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fames 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked it #222 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, on May 14,2008, The Library of Congress selected the song for preservation in the National Recording Registry. There were four players on the session, Roy Orbison, Billy Sanford, Jerry Kennedy. Billy Sanford, who played session for Elvis and Don Williams and many others. Williams introduced him as a kid who had just arrived Nashville, with a guitar, who heard Orbison was minus a guitar player. Other musicians on the record included Floyd Cramer on piano, Bob Moore on a bass, Boots Randolph and Charlie McCoy on sax. In 1989, the rap group 2 Live Crew recorded a parody of the Orbison song, using the alternate title Pretty Woman for their album As Clean As They Wanna Be. Orbisons publisher, Acuff-Rose Music sued 2 Live Crew on the basis that the fair use doctrine did not permit reuse of their material for profit. The case, Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc. went all the way to the United States Supreme Court, the Supreme Court decided in 2 Live Crews favor, greatly expanding the doctrine of fair use and extending its protections to parodies created for profit. It is considered a fair use decision. The song has been covered by a number of artists, In 1964, in 1965, a Finnish-language version by Eero ja Jussi & The Boys, on their album Numero 1
10. Roy Orbison – Roy Kelton Orbison, nicknamed the Big O, was an American singer-songwriter and musician, known for his distinctive, impassioned voice, complex compositions and dark emotional ballads. The combination led many critics to describe his music as operatic, between 1960 and 1964,22 of his songs placed on the Billboard Top 40, including Only the Lonely, Crying, and Oh, Pretty Woman. Orbison grew up in Texas and began singing in a rockabilly and country and he was signed by Sun Records in 1956, but his greatest success came with Monument Records in the early 1960s. His career stagnated in the 1970s, but was revived by several versions of his songs. In 1988, he was a member of the Traveling Wilburys supergroup, along with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and he recorded his last solo album, Mystery Girl, the same year but died of a heart attack shortly thereafter. While most male rock and roll performers in the 1950s and 1960s projected a defiant masculinity, many of Orbisons songs instead conveyed a quiet, almost desperate and his voice ranged from baritone to tenor, and music scholars have suggested that he had a three- or four-octave range. During performances, he was known for standing still and solitary, and for wearing black clothes and dark sunglasses, which lent an air of mystery to his persona. His honors include inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in the year. Rolling Stone placed him at number 37 on their list of the Greatest Artists of All Time, in 2002, Billboard magazine listed Orbison at number 74 in the Top 600 recording artists. Roy Kelton Orbison was born in Vernon, Texas, the son of Orbie Lee Orbison, an oil well driller and car mechanic, and Nadine Vesta Shults. Both of his parents were unemployed during the Great Depression and, searching for work, moved the family to Fort Worth, Texas and he attended Denver Avenue Elementary School until a polio scare prompted the family to return to Vernon. Later, they moved to Wink, Texas, Orbison later described life in Wink as football, oil fields, oil, grease and sand and expressed relief that he was able to leave the desolate town. All the Orbison children were afflicted with poor eyesight, Roy used thick corrective lenses from an early age and he was not confident about his appearance and began dyeing his nearly-white hair black when he was still young. He was quiet and self-effacing, remarkably polite and obliging — a product, biographer Alan Clayson wrote and he was readily available to sing, however, and often became the focus of attention when he did. He considered his voice memorable, if not great, on Roys sixth birthday, his father gave him a guitar. He later recalled that by the age of seven, I was finished, you know, for anything else and his major musical influence as a youth was country music. He was particularly moved by Lefty Frizzells singing, with its slurred syllables and he also enjoyed Hank Williams and Jimmie Rodgers. One of the first musicians he heard in person was Ernest Tubb, in West Texas, he was exposed to many forms of music, sepia, Tex-Mex, the orchestral arrangements of Mantovani and cajun