American Bandstand
From 1957 through 1963 Philadelphia was the “Home of the Hits,” a reflection of the power of Dick Clark’s American Bandstand television show, carried nationally on the American Broadcasting Company network. The program’s format was simple: singers mimed to their records, and the show’s teenage audience danced. Before the advent of Bandstand, no Philadelphia-based label had ever been consistently successful; in the wake of the show, several labels based in the city—including Cameo, Chancellor, Jamie, and Swan—were regularly on the charts. In 1960, during the congressional hearings on payola (money or gifts given by record labels to disc jockeys to ...(100 of 225 words)