CORRECTED - Diana Ross ends absence from singles chart

11/04/2005 2:45 PM, Reuters


In LOS ANGELES story headlined "Diana Ross ends 9-year absence from singles chart" please read the headline as "Diana Ross ends 6-year absence from singles chart" and the first paragraph as " ... a little more than six years since Diana Ross has appeared on a Billboard singles chart."

A corrected version follows:

By Fred Bronson

LOS ANGELES (Billboard) - It's been a little more than six years since Diana Ross has appeared on a Billboard singles chart. She was last on the Hot Dance Club Play list in 1999 with "Until We Meet Again," which peaked at No. 2 (and also made the Hot Dance Singles Sales and Hot R&B Singles Sales charts).

Ross returns to the charts this week, at No. 33 on the Adult Contemporary tally, paired with Rod Stewart on a George and Ira Gershwin tune, "I've Got a Crush on You" from Stewart's new J Records set "Thanks for the Memory... The Great American Songbook Vol. IV."

The Gershwins wrote "I've Got a Crush on You" in 1930. That means Ross has charted on the AC list with songs from seven consecutive decades. In 1973, Ross peaked at No. 8 with "Good Morning Heartache," a 1940s song popularized by Billie Holiday. The track was from the soundtrack to "Lady Sings the Blues," the Holiday biopic that starred Ross.

In 1981, she spent three weeks at No. 2 with the 1950s song first recorded by Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers, "Why Do Fools Fall in Love." Ross didn't make her debut on the AC tally until 1970, but after she did, she charted with two 1960s songs: a remake of Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell's "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" and a cover of the Four Tops' "Reach Out I'll Be There."

Ross also charted with original songs throughout the 1970s as well as the 1980s and the 1990s.

Should "I've Got a Crush on You" show up on The Billboard Hot 100 single chart, it would be Ross' first appearance on this chart since 1986, when she went to No. 66 with "Chain Reaction." It's unlikely the duet with Stewart will cross over to the Hot 100, since none of Stewart's "Great American Songbook" tracks have done so. Stewart last appeared on the Hot 100 in 1998 with "Ooh La La."

Stewart is the fifth male to be paired with Ross on an AC chart entry. The ex-Supreme has also collaborated with Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie and Julio Iglesias.

Reuters/Billboard