This list is selected each week by WXYZ Radio from reports of record sales gathered from leading record outlets in the Detroit area and other sources available to WXYZ.
— THE JIM HEDDLE COLLECTION —
This WXYZ chart was digitally restored by Motor City Radio Flashbacks
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A Charlie Brown Christmas is a 1965 studio album by American jazz pianist Vince Guaraldi (later credited to the Vince Guaraldi Trio). The album was released in December 1965 in the U.S. by Fantasy. It is the soundtrack to the Christmas television special of the same name.
Guaraldi composed most of the music, though he included versions of traditional carols such as “O Tannenbaum”. He recorded some of the score at Whitney Studio in Glendale, California, then re-recorded some of it at Fantasy Records Studios in San Francisco with a children’s choir from St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in nearby San Rafael. The sessions ran late into the night, with the children rewarded with ice cream afterwards.
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(Source: Wikipedia)
— Christmas Memories From the Soundtrack of Your Life —
Click on (COMPLETE LP) for the complete track listing on this album.
VINCE GUARALDI * A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS (COMPLETE LP)
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—57 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK—
The above WKNR music chart was digitally restored by Motor City Radio Flashbacks
— In MemoryofGeorge Griggs —
A SPECIAL THANK YOU
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A sincere, thank you, Mrs. Patti Griggs. This featured presentation would have not been possible without your generosity and your continuous support.
Above WKNR music chart courtesy of Mrs. Patti Griggs and the George L. Griggs estate.
‘The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album’ is the seventh studio album by the Beach Boys, released in November 1964. It contains five original songs and seven standards on a Christmas theme. The album proved to be a long-running success during subsequent Christmas seasons, initially reaching number six in the US Billboard 200 chart in its year of release and eventually going gold. Music historian James Perone wrote that it is “regarded as one of the finest holiday albums of the rock era”.
While leader Brian Wilson produced and arranged the rock songs, he left it to Dick Reynolds (an arranger for the Four Freshmen, a group Wilson idolized) to arrange the forty-one piece orchestral backings on the traditional songs to which the Beach Boys would apply their vocals. One single was released from the album, the original song “The Man with All the Toys” backed with the group’s rendition of “Blue Christmas”. “Little Saint Nick”, a single which had already been released the previous year, was included on the album.
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(Source: Wikipedia)
— Christmas Memories From the Soundtrack of Your Life —
Click on (COMPLETE LP) for the complete track listing from this album.
THE BEACH BOYS * THE BEACH BOYS’ CHRISTMAS ALBUM (COMPLETE LP) * 1964
We are pleased to announce on this page we added a brand new link to former WJR producer Kevin Collard and his current podcast show, ‘A Soul Encountered‘ to the site’s blogroll.
Kevin Collard was first hired at WJR in 1993. According to Kevin, he worked with over 30 hosts at WJR (not to mention Mike Whorf) including: Paul W Smith, Ken Calvert, David Newman and wrapping up his career there working with Frank Beckmann in 2009. Kevin also stated he did production work for Larry Patton, John McCullough, Kevin Joyce, Mitch Albom and other luminaries affiliated with Detroit radio as well.
Kevin Collard’s ‘A Soul Encountered‘ podcast page best describes what his podcasts is all about:
“A Soul encountered is a bi-weekly interview program focusing on spiritual matters, what has worked? what hasn’t? people of all kinds of backgrounds sit down and explain what they believe and why.
Hosted by radio veteran Kevin Collard and originating near Detroit, Michigan this broadcast strives to be high quality, compelling and thought provoking.”
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‘A SOUL ENCOUNTERED’ REMEMBERS CHUCK YEAGER
Featured on his podcast page today — and you may go HERE — in wake of Chuck Yeager’s passing just three days ago, Kevin Collard shares a brief WJR interview with the legendary record-setting jet pilot, conducted by the late J. P. McCarthy.
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— NOTES —
We are grateful and thankful as well, with his blessings, we will shortly be featuring on this site a two-hour tribute Kevin Collard created and produced in memory of WJR legend Mike Whorf, who recently passed away in November.
Good news! Kevin will be soon be donating his extensive WJR radio archive to this site as well. Many of his WJR memories and moments will be featured in future posts, here and to his credit, courtesy of Kevin’s generosity.
In December 1965, Motown Recording artists, The Supremes, booked a 13 day engagement at the popular Detroit nightclub venue, The Roostertail. According to the Detroit Free Press, the Supremes were scheduled beginning Friday, December 17 through Wednesday, December 29.
After their Detroit engagement, the group toured the south for several days with The Lovin’ Spoonful. The Detroit Free Press (Sunday, December 5, 1965) reported that The Supremes, “one of the hottest singing groups in the world” was close to completing their seventh album for Motown Records, ‘I Hear A Symphony‘.
The 1965 world famous Detroit girl group was also scheduled to tour the east, and they “will be the first entertainers (with Judy Garland) to appear in the Astrodome in Houston, Texas, will go to Hollywood for their third appearance with Ed Sullivan, and will get as far as San Juan, Puerto Rico,” according to the newpaper.
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The Supremes/Roostertail ad below appeared in the Detroit Free Press — 55 years ago today — Thursday, December 9, 1965.
NOTE: The featured ad and the exact Supremes photo printed in the ad was digitally re-imaged by Motor City Radio Flashbacks.
THIS SURVEY REFLECTS RETAIL SALES, REQUESTS AND POPULARITY AS JUDGED BY THE 93 FM MUSIC DEPARTMENT
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NUMBER ONE SINGLE ON WDRQ
— “EROTIC CITY” by PRINCE | WARNER BROS. —
WDRQ-FM Top 30 singles and albums for the week of December 3, 1984
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NUMBER ONE ALBUM ON WDRQ
— ‘THE WOMAN IN RED’ by STEVIE WONDER | MOTOWN —
The above WDRQ music chart was digitally restored by Motor City Radio Flashbacks
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— In MemoryofGeorge Griggs —
A SPECIAL THANK YOU
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A sincere, thank you, Mrs. Patti Griggs. This featured presentation would have not been possible without your generosity and your continuous support.
Above WDRQ music chart courtesy of Mrs. Patti Griggs and the George L. Griggs estate.
Detroit Dealers Frown on Detroit Radio Music Chart Value; Not Used as ‘Guides’
DETROIT – While local record merchandisers claim that area radio “Top 40 charts” are highly inaccurate, they say that they are able to live with the situation because no one in the Motor City market uses radio charts as a buying guide.
This lack of direct chart influence on record sales, according to dealers, is due to the relatively high number of competing Big Beat radio stations in the area – all offering slightly different formats and none having a clearly dominant influence as taste-maker in the Detroit pop market.
WKNR MUSIC GUIDE August 22, 1966
Sam Press, co-owner of the Ross Music Shops in Detroit, said that “There are actually three influential rock stations – two here and one in Windsor, Canada, competing for the kids’ attention, plus two very strong R&B stations. You have to remember that because of Motown, R&B is a stronger product here than it might be in other markets. So what you have is kids constantly switching dials between all these stations and not being dominated by any of them. A ‘Keener’ (WKNR) chart might have some of the most popular songs in the area on it but it will invariably be late in listing a big English hit which the kids have been hearing on CKLW of Windsor, and will likewise be late in listing a hot R&B number that has been exposed by one of the other stations.”
“What this means,” he said, “is that teenagers choose the best of several stations. For this reason we don’t have to buy according to anybody’s chart. The independent dealers in this town wait until they start getting requests before they will order anything – except something by a very hot artist.”
Asked if his customers would not seek out a competitor who already had the hits in stock, Press said: “The racks are even slower in getting current singles out – we can move faster than our competition.”
Not Used as Guide
Lou Salesin, a 35-year veteran of the business who owns Mumford Music Shop, said that he also does not use “radio charts as buying guides. I must ignore WKNR and the other lists; they are inaccurate for a number of reasons. Some of these inaccuracies could he eliminated -and I would like to see that happen, just for the principle of the thing.”
Sol Margolis, owner of the Ross Music Stores, told Billboard: “I only order what I get calls for, plus a minimum of new releases by established artists. To my knowledge, no Detroit dealer uses radio charts as any kind of a buying guide. We know better than to trust what those sheets say.”
Another dealer, who did not wish to be identified, said that “you simply cannot believe what the radio charts list. The trouble is that there are too many pop records being released. I think the manufacturers are working on some sort of percentage planning. They just keep churning the records out, hoping that 5 per cent or so will make money for them.
WXYZ SOUND SURVEY August 29, 1966
“As far as local charts are concerned,” he added, “we often see a record that hasn’t been shipped already on the sheet. Other times, we see stations keeping numbers on the charts long after they have stopped selling. They do this, apparently because they got on a record too late, and then refuse to admit that their influence hasn’t been able to keep it a hot seller. There are many complicating factors, but the end result is inaccurate charts. All the dealers know this, and they depend on requests and their own experience in the business to tell them how to buy.”
Chet Kajeski, of Martin and Snyder, a one-stop in Detroit, told Billboard: “I find frequent discrepancies on the radio charts. As far as I am concerned, they hurt jukebox operators in the area. By failing to list, and expose on the air, what is a legitimate ‘adult’ hit, they can cut down play on the boxes. This happens with a record that sells very well in the area, deserves to be listed on the charts, but doesn’t get listed because the stations don’t feel it is in their format.” Because such a record does not get the additional push of air play, its life on a jukebox is sometimes shortened.
“I don’t believe,” Kajeski added, “that many record dealers are affected by the charts in the Detroit area. By being inaccurate, these charts defeat their own purpose.” END
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Information and news source: Billboard; September 3, 1966
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STREAMING THIS AFTERNOON ON DETROIT PUBLIC TELEVISION
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To view the DPTV program stream: click on the highlighted link just below the Scott Morgan photo.
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— DPTV.ORG * SATURDAY, DECEMBER 5 * 4:00 PM —
Robin Seymour September 2019 (Photo credit: Kevin Willett)
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Scott Morgan of The Rationals talks Robin Seymour on DPTV.(Photo credit: William Kubota; WTVS)
