The DJ Music Chart for this week will be Contemporary Hit Radio for the week of June 5th. Justin Timberlake, Macklemore and Pink still maintain spots in the top 5 but this week. Icona Pop and Demi Lovato join them with Selena Gomez right behind them at number 6 with “Come and Get It”.
What is the DJ Music Chart Contemporary Hit Radio?
No matter how the industry dresses it up, the audience recognizes it for what it is “Top 40.” The term Contemporary Hit Radio or “CHR” was coined during the late 1970s, early 1980s when radio programmers perceived a backlash against Top 40. During that decade Album Oriented Rock “AOR” stations began rising to prominence on the FM dial. Top 40 was perceived as a format for AM radio. Many saw the format as restrictive and expressed a preference for the free formats that were developing on the FM band.
Programmers chose to bring Top 40 to the FM band disguised as CHR.
| The basic concept behind hit music stations is quite simple: Confine the playlist to those songs that are currently the fastest selling and most popular (sales being a barometer of popularity) This is the same approach that CHR’s forerunner, Top 40 employed. (Keith 1987, p. 59) So the industry calls it CHR, while the listening audience continues to call it what it is Top 40. It continues to be popular. The basic format element of shortening the playlist to the most popular songs have spread to all other formats.CHR/Top 40 is considered the oldest format. Many argue that Middle-of-the-Road “MOR” is older. While the form of radio known as MOR/Nostalgia predates CHR/Top 40, it was not seen as a format until after the development of Top 40. |
CHR/Top 40 began developing around 1955 when Todd Storz and Bill Stewart at KOWH in Omaha Nebraska (see Format Developments) noticed that patron of a local bar played the same songs over and over. COM 418 Radio Programming and Production at the University of Delaware
What is your current favorite on this week’s DJ Music Chart?
DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & Boston DJ
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