Past Times
Jimmy Osmond set a record 50 years ago as the youngest performer to reach number one. MARION McMULLEN looks back at some child chart toppers
OSMONDMANIA was sweeping Britain 50 years ago and Jimmy Osmond was the super-cute kid with the ‘ahhhh’ factor.
The youngest member of the famous American singing family was only nine years old when he released Long Haired Lover From Liverpool in March, 1972.
He was soon appearing on Top Of The Pops, billed as Little Jimmy Osmond, and cheerfully warbling “I’ll be your clown or your puppet or your April Fool, if you’ll be my sunshine daisy from LA.”
The up-beat song went on to become a number one chart hit, making Jimmy the youngest performer to top the UK music charts – a record which has never been broken.
“I remember it all really well,” he once said of his musical childhood. “I’ve such strong memories, but I don’t know if that’s because I’ve seen so many TV clips and photos of that time and it feels like a real memory.”
Jimmy was even younger when he was awarded his first gold disc for a recording of My Little Darling, which he sang in Japanese when he was only seven. Long Haired Lover From Liverpool came along two years later and earned him a place in the Guinness Book Of World Records along with an invitation to perform before Queen Elizabeth at the Royal Gala Variety Performance at the London Palladium in aid of the British Olympics Appeal Fund. He and his brothers were presented to the Queen and Jimmy got to shake her hand.
He went on to collect six gold records, one platinum record, and two gold albums as a solo singer, a haul that secured him a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Londoner Helen Shapiro was the youngest female singer to have a number one UK hit. She was only 14 when her single You Don’t Know saw her topping the charts in 1961, and she followed it up with Walkin’ Back To Happiness. Both sold more than a million copies and earned her two gold discs. The Clapton Park Secondary School pupil saw her career soar in the 1960s and she accompanied the Beatles on their first national tour in 1963. John Lennon and Paul McCartney even wrote a song for her called Misery, but her producer turned it down.
Across the pond, Stevie Wonnder made his mark on the Amerrican music charts at a young ng age. He was 11 when he signed ed his first record deal and just 13 when he celebrated his first st number one hit with Fingertips s (Part 2) in 1963 – making him m the youngest performer to ever r top the US Billboard charts.
The blind self-taught musician and singer was originally billed as Little Stevie Wonder and once said: “Mama was my greatest teacher, a teacher of compassion, love and fearlessness. If life is sweet as a flower, then my mother is that sweet flower of love.”
Scottish singer Marie McDonald McLaughlin Lawrie was 15 when she found fame in 1964, as Lulu, when her first single Shout made the UK top 10. She said: “Even before I had a hit record I was doing three or four live gigs each week.”
Billie Piper was also 15 when her debut single Because We Want To went straight in at the top in the June of 1998. Her music career continued until the end of 2000. Doctor Who’s future travelling companion has since said she found fame at such a young age a challenge.
TV talent show Opportunity Knocks introduced viewers to Lena Zavaroni in 1974, and the little Scottish singer with the big voice went on to win the competition for a recordbreaking five weeks.
She was just 10 when her album Ma! became a top 10 hit and, at 12, she headlined a Royal Variety show, had a record deal, a TV show and had performed with Frank Sinatra and Liza Minnelli. But on October 1, 1999, after years as a virtual recluse, depressed Lena died from pneumonia at the age of 35.
American singer Tiffany was 16 when she recorded her 1987 single I Think We’re Alone Now. It had originally been written for Tommy James and the Shondells in 1967. Tiffany did a tour of shopping malls across the US to promote it.
Pop idol runner-up Gareth Gates was 17 when his cover version of Unchained Melody – a song he had performed in the final of the TV show – debuted at number one in 2002. It would eventually go platinum, making him the youngest male singer to have a song reach number one in its first week of release.
The Bradford boy said his whole life had always been about music. mus
He recal recalled: “Having a stammer meant mea it was hard to express myself through speech as a a child. I always sang an and played musical instr instruments and that was h how I expressed
myself.”