Classic Countdown

The Classic Countdown is a syndicated weekly, four-hour, hit-packed, oldies countdown program which was written, produced and hosted by Radio Hall-of-Fame broadcaster Dick Bartley. It is flagshipped at WCBS-FM in New York City and is syndicated across the country by United Stations Radio Networks and internationally via Radio Express.

Twenty featured songs from a particular season — often, from the 1970s — are featured and played countdown-style, from No. 20 to No. 1. The Billboard Hot 100 chart is the standard for this ranking. In addition, on the first weekend of every month, the show has a "yearbook special" highlighting the top hits of a given year.

History

Though Bartley had hosted national radio shows since 1982, it was not until 1991 that he launched a countdown show. It was originally named American Gold. The concept of American Gold is loosely based upon the formats of other ABC shows, American Top 40 and American Country Countdown, although Casey Kasem (who created those shows) was never involved in the creation of Gold (Kasem had left ABC by the time Bartley had joined in 1991).

There were a few minor differences in American Gold and the current Classic Countdown. Most notably, the countdowns were shorter, with 10 to 15 songs, as opposed to the standard 20 on the current incarnation. The featured songs usually followed a category; a featured band is usually the focus, but occasionally Bartley makes an exception for a special holiday. For bands or categories with fewer hits, Bartley will split the show in two: the first half having a theme, and the second featuring the top hits of a particular three-month span (e.g. fall of 1974 or winter of 1969-70); the current incarnation does not use themes except in a few special circumstances.

Prior to 2007, Bartley conducted a contest known as "The Quiz Man" where listeners could win prizes. Said contest was discontinued. Bartley announced his departure from ABC effective March 31, 2009 (Tom Kent has been named as Bartley's successor, and Kent will not be taking over this particular show); his last American Gold show, a 1975 Yearbook, was released to stations March 28. The show was relaunched under its current name when Bartley joined the United Stations Radio Networks on April 1 of that year. The American Gold Web page, now discontinued, apparently considered the two shows to be the same. However, ABC likely still holds rights to the "American Gold" name, which originates with ABC's former subsidiary Watermark Inc. (similarly, Bob Kingsley had to change the name of his countdown show from American Country Countdown to Bob Kingsley's Country Top 40 when Kingsley left ABC for what is now Dial Global in 2006, and Casey Kasem, upon leaving ABC, changed the name of his show from American Top 40 to Casey's Top 40 from 1988 to 1998 before buying back the AT40 name).

When the show moved to United Stations in 2009, the newly rechristened program began focusing on a particular year or season and is featuring exactly 20 countdown songs each week. In addition to this national show, a local Sunday Night Countdown will air on WCBS-FM. The WCBS version of the show features two top-20 lists, one of which will usually (though not always) match the syndicated top-20 list, and the other which will be either 10 years after or 10 years before the syndicated list. For example, if the first two hours are from January 1975, then the second two hours would be from January 1985, but if the first two hours are from January 1976, then the second two hours would be from January 1966.

External links

• Official website of The Classic Countdown Show