Concept
Billboard magazine only charted Christmas singles and albums along with the other popular non-holiday records until the 1958 holiday season when they published their first section that surveys only Christmas music. An increase of Christmas records began charting Billboard in 1957. The popular music surveys charted 9 Christmas singles, including the debut of the Bobby Helms' standard "Jingle Bell Rock" (Top 100 Sides #6). Gene Autry's newly recorded version of his 1949 original "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" made the Top 100 Sides at #70. The Best Selling Pop LP's had 11 seasonal albums chart including the debut of Elvis' Christmas Album that topped the survey for 3 weeks. Bing Crosby's all-time best-selling single "White Christmas" returned to the Top 40 again in 1957 at #34. His holiday classic has charted Billboard's surveys almost annually since it first spent 11 consecutive weeks at No. 1 on their Best Selling Retail Records chart beginning Oct. 31, 1942 It reached the top spot again in 1945 for two more weeks and made its 14th #1 week on December 28, 1946. Crosby's "Silent Night" (Top 100 Sides #54) and "Silver Bells" (Top 100 Sides #78) also made the Top 100 Sides in 1957. All 3 of these titles are included on his Merry Christmas which returned to #1 in January 1958 after charting Billboard album surveys since its debut in 1945. On November 24, 1958, the magazine published Deejay's Favorite Christmas Disks. Described as the records played most frequently by disk jockeys each Christmas season, according to a survey made by The Billboard, the section consisted of 3 top 10 lists charting the top Holiday Singles, LP Albums and for the only time on Billboard's Christmas/Holiday surveys, EP Albums. Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" was the #1 single, Percy Faith's 1954 Music of Christmas was the #1 LP and Pat Boone's 1957 Merry Christmas was the #1 EP. A Holiday survey would not be published again until the annual Christmas Records section is launched in 1963.
