What was the 1st million selling record ?

Ed Altrichter · From: Schroeder, Minnesota, USA

What was the first song to sell a million
records, and by whom ? Vernon Dalhart is
credited with having COUNTRY MUSIC'S first
million - selling record circa 1924 with
"The Prisoner's Song", but had there
been a million-selling record in some
other music genre prior to that ?
Ed

Ed Altrichter · From: Schroeder, Minnesota, USA

The Wreck of the Old 97, sorry . . . . But I'm still wondering if there was a million selling record before
Vernon Dalhart's in 1924. Ed

Rick Campbell · From: Sneedville, TN, USA

In 1907,"Vesti la giubba" (Victrola 88061) Was The Very First Recording In The World To Sell One Million Copies

You can hear it here:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=gdzbZBbN5tY

Marlin Smoot · From: Kansas

Also interesting to note that the "Tracking" of sales and airplay didn't start (As we know it today) until the 1940's and was still in development well into the 1950's.
Here's some more good reading on the tracking of sales and airplay. You'll also see how "impressions" are directly linked to ratings and how important ratings and music are to the revenue of a radio station.
This is one of the reasons why 'indy' artist and labels have such a hard time getting airplay.
MS

What is now the Hot 100 had existed for nearly fifteen years as numerous charts, tracking and ranking the most popular singles of the day in several areas. During the 1940s and 1950s, popular singles were ranked in three significant charts:

Best Sellers In Stores — ranked the biggest selling singles in retail stores, as reported by merchants surveyed throughout the country (20 to 50 positions).

Most Played By Jockeys — ranked the most played songs on United States radio stations, as reported by radio disc jockeys and radio stations (20 to 25 positions).

Most Played In Jukeboxes — ranked the most played songs in jukeboxes across the United States (20 positions). This was one of the main outlets of measuring song popularity with the younger generation of music listeners, as many radio stations resisted adding rock 'n roll music to their playlists for many years.

Although officially all three charts had equal "weight" in terms of their importance, many chart historians refer to the Best Sellers In Stores chart when referencing a song’s performance prior to the creation of the Hot 100.

Billboard eventually created a fourth singles popularity chart that combined all aspects of a single’s performance (sales, airplay and jukebox activity), based on a point system that typically gave sales (purchases) more weight than radio airplay.

On the week ending November 12, 1955, Billboard published The Top 100 for the first time.

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.

On June 17, 1957, Billboard discontinued the Most Played In Jukeboxes chart, as the popularity of jukeboxes waned and radio stations incorporated more and more rock-oriented music into their playlists. The week ending July 28, 1958 was the final publication of the Most Played By Jockeys and Top 100 charts, both of which had Perez Prado's instrumental version of "Patricia" ascending to the top.

On August 4, 1958, Billboard premiered one main all-genre singles chart: the Hot 100. Although similar to the Top 100, the first Hot 100 chart reset all songs’ "weeks on chart" status to "1". The Hot 100 quickly became the industry standard and Billboard discontinued the Best Sellers In Stores chart on October 13, 1958.

Billboard produces the Hot 100 to this day and it is still the standard by which a song’s popularity is measured in the United States. The Hot 100 is still compiled by combining a song’s radio airplay points and sales points (both at retail and digitally).

There are several component charts that contribute to the overall calculation of the Hot 100. The most significant ones are shown below.

Hot 100 Airplay — (per Billboard) approximately 1,000 stations, "composed of adult contemporary, R&B, hip-hop, country, rock, gospel, Latin and Christian formats, digitally monitored twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

Charts are ranked by number of gross audience impressions, computed by cross-referencing exact times of radio airplay with Arbitron listener data."

Hot 100 Singles Sales — (per Billboard) "the top selling singles compiled from a national sample of retail store, mass merchant and internet sales reports collected, compiled, and provided by Nielsen SoundScan."

Les Anderson · From: The Great White North

This one is really debatable. Within the USA, the song White Christmas is said to be the world's #1 song of all time. However, in the rest of the world the song that is considered to be the most sold, most recorded and most performed song of all time is another Christmas carol, "Silent Night"

I think I will believe that Silent Night is the world's number one selling, sung and played song of all time. If one considers it an album song then again, how many artist and orchestras have recorded a Christmas album that have not included "Silent Night"?

Marlin Smoot · From: Kansas

What about "Happy Birthday"?

Donny Hinson · From: Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.

Yes. "Happy Birthday" (a.k.a "Good Morning To You") is certainly the most performed song melody. (At least, in the English-speaking countries. Winking

)

Les Anderson · From: The Great White North

If I am not mistaking was the original question not, "which song was the first million seller?".

I agree that Happy Birthday may be the most sung song in North America; however, when one looks at thing globally, the picture changes.

Ed Altrichter · From: Schroeder, Minnesota, USA

Thanks for the replies ! What I would like to know is
what song was the first (single) song to sell a million records ? ( Not which song sold the most records ever, nor which song is sang the most, nor which song sold the most sheet music, etc. )
Ed

Ed Altrichter · From: Schroeder, Minnesota, USA

It looks like Rick Campbell named it. Thanks, Rick.

Charles Davidson · From: Phenix City Alabama, USA

Don't know about the guys,but Miss Rubye Blevins AKA Patsy Montana from Ark was the first female to have a million seller in 1935,with I want to be a cowboy's sweatheart. DYKBC.
_________________
Hard headed, opinionated old geezer. BAMA CHARLIE. GOD BLESS AMERICA. ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVIST. SUPPORT LIVE MUSIC !

Donny Hinson · From: Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.

As Marlin indicated, real good info is kinda scarce. Michael Biel, noted PhD historian and musicologist doubts anyone sold a million records before the '30s. Apparently, RCA was the big gorilla at the time, and often inflated their sales figures (which no one seems to have kept good records on) for their own benefit. Other sources also indicate that despite Caruso's popularity, he never sold a million copies of anything in his lifetime (he died in 1921).

After much research, I'm going to leave this question to spectulation. I don't think we really know, or can tell, who the first artist was that sold a million recordings of a single song.

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