The

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts C ...

is a

record chart A record chart, in the music industry, also called a music chart, is a ranking of Sound recording and reproduction, recorded music according to certain criteria during a given period. Many different criteria are used in worldwide charts, often ...

based on weekly album sales; during the 1950s, a total of 17 different albums reached number one. The longest run at number one was the original soundtrack of the movie '' South Pacific'', which held on to the top spot for 60 consecutive weeks in the 1950s, and went on to attain another 55 weeks in 1960 and 1961, totalling a record of 115 weeks at number-one in the UK. It was number-one for the entire year in 1959. The UK Albums Chart canon was modified when chart fans Alan Smith and Keith Badman discovered that charts of albums in the UK dated back to 28 July 1956, not 8 November 1958 as previously thought. The first album chart was a Top 5 published in ''

Record Mirror ''Record Mirror'' was a British weekly music newspaper between 1954 and 1991 for pop fans and record collectors. Launched two years after the ''NME'', it never attained the circulation of its rival. The first UK album chart was published in ''Re ...

''. The album at number one on this chart was ''

Songs for Swingin' Lovers! ''Songs for Swingin' Lovers!'' is the tenth album by American singer Frank Sinatra and his fourth for Capitol Records. It was arranged by Nelson Riddle and released in March 1956 on LP and January 1987 on CD. It was the first album ever to top ...

'' by

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Chairman of the Board" and later called "Ol' Blue Eyes", Sinatra was one of the most popular ...

. From 8 November 1958, a Top 10 album chart was compiled by ''

Melody Maker ''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born ...

''. Although the ''Record Mirror'' chart continued to run after this date, ''Melody Maker'' is taken as the canonical source as it had a larger sample. In 1959, from June to August a newspaper strike prevented the album chart from being published and the previous chart was duplicated in these weeks. Nevertheless, the '' South Pacific''

soundtrack A soundtrack is recorded music accompanying and synchronised to the images of a motion picture, drama, book, television program, radio program, or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack o ...

was number one for the entire duration of 1959.

Number ones

By artist

Five artists topped the album chart during the 1950s. Original soundtracks and cast recordings are omitted.

Christmas number ones

In the UK, Christmas number-one albums are those that are at the top of the

Christmas Day Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year, ...

. Typically, this will refer to the album that was announced as number one on the Sunday before 25 December—when Christmas Day falls on a Sunday itself, the official number one is considered by the OCC to be the one announced on that day's chart. During the 1950s, the following albums were Christmas number ones.

Comparison to ''Record Mirror'' album chart

From 8 November 1958, ''Melody Maker'' is regarded as the canonical source. ''Record Mirror'' continued to compile an album chart with the following differences:

Notes

References

;Footnotes ;Sources *

External links

Archive of all UK Number One Albums of the 1950s with images of original packagingOfficial UK Albums Top 100
at the

Official Charts Company The Official Charts (legal name: The Official UK Charts Company Limited) is a British inter-professional organization that compiles various "official" record charts in the United Kingdom, Ireland and France. In the United Kingdom, its charts inc ...

The Official UK Top 40 Albums Chart
at

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:List of UK Albums Chart Number Ones of the 1950s

UK Albums The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts ...

1950s The 1950s (pronounced nineteen-fifties; commonly abbreviated as the "Fifties" or the " '50s") (among other variants) was a decade that began on January 1, 1950, and ended on December 31, 1959. Throughout the decade, the world continued its re ...