Hit Parade

Selected excerpts from our archive offer more context on this subject. Each reading links to the original article and its sources.

The Walkman took music beyond the room

Portability did not mean that collective listening spaces disappeared. The record of the Chilean television programme Hit Parade, for example, describes a format that presented popular songs and used the chart criteria of the time. It aired from 1967 to 1971. This reference does not document the Walkman directly, but it offers a counterpoint: popular music also circulated through shared broadcasts and rankings. Personal listening and public programming are better understood as different practices that coexisted than as stages that cleanly replaced one another.

Television schedules can be reconstructed beyond the screen

Annuals, television guides and programme listings can provide times, titles and durations. One supplied source describes Hit Parade, a Chilean programme broadcast by Canal 9 from 1967 to 1971: it says that it initially aired weekly, usually on Tuesdays, and that by around 1970 it was shown Monday to Friday at 7:30 p.m., with a duration of thirty minutes. This is a concrete example of how a schedule can reveal changes in frequency and time slot.