Any honest cataloguing of the most iconic records of the 1950s has to be heavy on rock & roll. Certainly you can make a case for “Cold Cold Heart” (1951) and “Your Cheatin’ Heart” (1953) by country legend Hank Williams, but I’ve got to begin with “Rock Around the Clock” by Bill Haley & His Comets, the 1954 rockabilly single that more than any other number kick-started the rock & roll era when it was inserted into the 1955 film Blackboard Jungle, becoming one of the best-selling singles of all-time in the process.  

         Little Richard’s 1955 breakout classic, “Tutti Frutti”, with its epochal a cappella opening, “A-wop-bop-a-loo-mop-a lop-bam-bam” and driving, seminal rock & roll rhythm transfixed the young Robert Zimmerman (later Bob Dylan), David Jones (aka David Bowie), and millions of other listeners. Mojo magazine called it the Number 1 record that changed the world, while the Library of Congress includes it on its National Recording Registry.

         Elvis Presley so dominated the ’50s record charts that it almost seems unfair to pick just one of his songs as a strong case can be made for “Heartbreak Hotel” and “Jailhouse Rock”, but I’ve gotta go with “Hound Dog”, his 1956 smash that spent 11 weeks atop the pop chart, was his all-time best-seller, topped as well the R&B and country charts, and stirred up the initial blowback that Elvis just might be a menace to society. Before Elvis made the song his own, three years earlier it had been a huge blues hit for Big Mama Thornton.

         Like Presley, Chuck Berry could be represented by several classics, but “Johnny B. Goode” is widely recognized as one of the defining songs of the rock & roll era. With his usual storytelling prowess, Berry captures the dream of a poor country boy to one day be a renowned guitar master. The song was chosen in 1977 to go into space as part of the Voyager Golden Record that contains “sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on earth.”

         The fifth selection takes us outside the field of rock & roll to an immortal piece of swinging pop, Bobby Darin’s unforgettable 1959 version of “Mack the Knife”. Originally a German murder ballad from 1928’s The Threepenny Opera, “Mack the Knife” tells the sordid tale of a murderous thief. Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong both did English versions of it, but Darin’s arresting take has become definitive, winning the coveted Grammy Record of the Year and a place on the National Recording Registry.

         -Steve Williams (6/26/23) – Greatest Recording Artists Blog Post #22