theshirelles.com — the records the Shirelles made

An empty theatre stage of about 1960 seen from the front rows, lit from the wings, no performers

The first girl group to have a US number one, and the records that got them there.

Shirley Owens thought the song sounded country and did not want to sing it. Luther Dixon put strings on it, several cities kept it off the air, and in the first week of January 1961 it was the number one record in America — the first by a Black girl group.

Start with the record that changed the count

Four schoolfriends from Passaic, New Jersey — Shirley Owens, Doris Coley, Addie Harris and Beverly Lee — sang first as the Poquellos. Nineteen pages here follow the records, the label Florence Greenberg built around them, and the arithmetic underneath.

A record pressing plant of about 1960, an adult press operator in an apron lifting a hot 45 off the die — **Where a hit becomes freight**A press operator lifting a disc off the die. A number one is an industrial quantity before it is anything else.Generated image

A city record shop of about 1960, a rack of 45s in plain paper sleeves and a listening booth behind — **The counter that counted**Chart position was assembled from shops like this one — what the rack sold, phoned in and tallied.Generated image

Tonight’s bill

Tonight’s bill, in the order the country bought it

A control room of about 1960 with a tape machine running and the monitor lamp lit

No. 1 · first week of January 1961 Will You Love Me Tomorrow

Goffin and King wrote it upstairs at 1650 Broadway and the singer did not want it. Dixon slowed it, hired strings Scepter could barely afford, and several cities left it off the air anyway.

The session, the arrangement, the ban

The room where the tempo came downThe arrangement was decided at the desk, not by the writers who sold the song.Generated image

What followed it, and how high it got

1 Soldier Boy Their second number one, cut quickly at the end of a session with time left on the clock. 3 Dedicated to the One I Love A cover that charted twice, two years apart, and did better the second time. 4 Mama Said A hook built out of a spoken phrase, and the arrangement that carried it. 8 Baby It's You Bacharach's melody, a celeste, and a vocal recorded closer than the era usually allowed. 39 Tonight’s the Night The record before the number one, and the one that proved the group could carry a session of their own.

Numerals are the record’s highest position on the Hot 100. All six sides, in order.

The ban

Some programme directors heard a young woman deciding, and left the record off the log.

It sold in the cities that played it and in the cities that did not. Why some stations said no

The signature

A label a housewife built around four schoolfriends

Florence Greenberg ran Tiara out of her own house in Passaic when she signed them. Scepter came afterwards and was built on their records — the arrangers it could afford, the players it kept, and the trust their earnings were held in, which took years of litigation to unpick.

Tiara, Scepter, and the contracts