1951 – Top 20 singles, Billboard

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Top 20 singles, Billboard – 1950 (closed for repair)
Top 20 singles, Billboard – 1952

1. Too Young » Nat King Cole
2. Because Of You » Tony Bennett
3. How High The Moon » Les Paul & Mary Ford
4. Come On-a My House » Rosemary Clooney
5. Be My Love » Mario Lanza
6. On Top Of Old Smoky » The Weavers
7. Cold, Cold Heart » Tony Bennett
8. If » Perry Como
9. Loveliest Night Of The Year » Mario Lanza
10. Tennessee Waltz » Patti Page
11. Jezebel » Frankie Laine
12. I Get Ideas » Tony Martin
13. Mockin’ Bird Hill » Les Paul & Mary Ford
14. Mockin’ Bird Hill » Patti Page
15. My Heart Cries For You » Guy Mitchell & Mitch Miller
16. (It’s No) Sin » Eddy Howard
17. Sound Off » Vaughn Monroe
18. Sweet Violets » Dinah Shore
19. The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise » Les Paul & Mary Ford
20. My Truly, Truly Fair » Guy Mitchell & Mitch Miller

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1. Too Young (m. Sid Lippman, w. Sylvia Dee) — Nat King Cole

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2. Because of You ( Arthur Hammerstein and Dudley Wilkinson) published 1940 — Tony Bennett

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3. How High The Moon (m. Morgan Lewis, w. Nancy Hamilton) published in 1940. “It was first featured,” says Wikipedia, “in the Broadway revue Two for the Show, where it was sung by Alfred Drake and Frances Comstock.”

See my separate feature page: How High The Moon

Les Paul & Mary Ford

on Alistair Cooke’s “Omnibus,” broadcast on 23 October 1953

The Youtube provider describes the footage (spelling corrected and punctuation normalized):

Les Paul & Mary Ford appear on Alistair Cooke’s “Omnibus” (10/23/1953) to dispel rumors that their recordings are all electrical gadgetry. They perform two demonstrations of their recording techniques (one fake, making fun of rumors, and one real with his multitrack recorders). He is using his now famous Ampex model 200 machine (1-inch tape) given to him by friend Bing Crosby. He added an extra recording playhead to each to create the 1st multitrack system. Note: this is NOT the Ampex 8-track Les Paul commissioned in 1954 and finished [sic] in 1957.

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4. Come On-a My House (Ross Bagdasarian and William Saroyan) — Published in 1939. Wikipedia notes that “Bagdasarian was better known by the stage name David Seville, which he used on his recordings featuring Alvin and the Chipmunks.” William Saroyan was an acclaimed American dramatist and author. Rosemary Clooney’s 1951 recording was the first hit with the song.

Rosemary Clooney

Bagdasarian & Saroyan – recorded, according to what I’ve read, in 1951 after Clooney’s version became a hit

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5. Be My Love (m. Nicholas Brodszky, w. Sammy Cahn) from the feature film Toast of New Orleans (1950)

Mario Lanza with the Jeff Alexander Choir and orchestra conducted by Ray Sinatra, recorded 27 June 1950

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6. On Top of Old Smoky (traditional) — The Weavers

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7. Cold, Cold Heart (Hank Williams) — I guess America wasn’t quite ready to have a country song top the pop charts just yet, unless it was sung by a pop singer.

Tony Bennett had scored a #1 hit in 1950 with Because of You, his first single. In the following year, Cold, Cold Heart became his second #1. Though Bennett had many additional hits and continued to make the charts through the mid-1960s, he had only one more single reach #1, Rags to Riches in 1953. In 1954 he had his biggest crop of hits (top 40) with seven.

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8. If (They Made Me a King) – music: Tolchard Evans, words: Robert Hargreaves and Stanley J. Damerell – The song was published in 1934, but the most popular versions were recorded in 1950-1951. Perry Como’s recording topped the charts for several weeks in early 1951, bumping Patti Page’s The Tennessee Waltz out of the top position on two of the three Billboard singles charts.

Perry Como

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9. Loveliest Night of the Year

Mario Lanza recorded the song for the MGM musical film The Great Caruso.

Wikipedia says:

The music was first published as a waltz called “Sobre las olas” (“Over the Waves”) in 1888 written by Juventino P. Rosas. In 1950 the music was adapted by Irving Aaronson with lyrics by Paul Francis Webster for the movie The Great Caruso.

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10. Tennessee Waltz (m. Pee Wee King, w. Redd Stewart)

The first commercial recording of the song (with the title misspelled as “Tennesee Waltz”) was “probably” the one made by Cowboy Copas in April 1947, according to an article on the song at populartunes.nl. However, this recording, issued on the 78 rpm single King 696, b/w “How Much Do I Owe You,” wasn’t released until March 1948. The co-songwriter credit to Copas present on the label of King 696-A is omitted from later recordings. A 2 December 1947 recording by Pee Wee King and His Golden West Cowboys was released in January 1948 as the B-side of “Rootie Tootie” (Fred Rose), on RCA Victor 20-2680, and became a #3 country hit in April that year.

Patti Page was one of the most successful recording stars of the 1950s, with 22 top 10 hits from 1950 to 1958 and 36 top 40 singles during the decade.

In 1965, “Tennessee Waltz” became the fourth state song of Tennessee.

Patti Page with orchestra conducted by Jack Rael — originally issued (as “The Tennessee Waltz”) 14 October 1950, on Mercury 5534, as the B-side of the 78 rpm single “Boogie Woogie Santa Claus” (Leon Rene); reissued in November(?) 1950, with the sides reversed, as Mercury 5534-X45

Billboard peaks and duration, by chart:
#1 — Best Sellers in Stores (9 weeks, from Dec 30, 1950)
#1 — Most Played by Jockeys (8 weeks, from Jan 6, 1951)
#1 — Most Played in Jukeboxes (12 weeks, from Jan 6, 1951)

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11. Jezebel (Wayne Shanklin) – first recorded by Frankie Laine with the Norman Luboff Choir and Mitch Miller and his orchestra on 4 April 1951

Frankie Laine – early TV production (date unknown)

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12. I Get Ideas (m. Dorcas Cochran, w. Sanders)

Tony Martin

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13. Mockin’ Bird Hill (Vaughn Horton)

Les Paul & Mary Ford

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14. Mockin’ Bird Hill

Patti Page

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15. My Heart Cries for You (Carl Sigman, Percy Faith) — According to Wikipedia, the song was adapted by Sigman and Faith from an 18th century French melody,^[1] the music being from “La jardiniere du Roi,” a song attributed to Marie Antoinette.

Guy Mitchell with Mitch Miller and his Orchestra