With Harry Belafonte’s Death, These Are the Only Billboard 200-Topping Artists From the Pre-Beatles Years Still Alive

Harry Belafonte, who died on Tuesday (April 25) at age 96, made history in March 1956, becoming the first artist to top Billboard’s weekly album chart, now known as the Billboard 200. He achieved the feat with his sophomore album Belafonte, which held the top spot for six consecutive weeks.

With Belafonte’s death, just four Billboard 200-topping artists from the years before The Beatles’ explosive arrival in 1964 are still living.

In addition, a handful of artists who were featured on Billboard 200-topping original cast albums and soundtracks between 1956 and 1964 are still living, but those albums weren’t credited to them individually. Most notably, the legendary Julie Andrews, 87, was featured on the cast albums to My Fair Lady, which topped the chart for 15 nonconsecutive weeks starting in July 1956, and Camelot, which topped the chart for six consecutive weeks in June and July 1961. Andrews, of course, was also featured on two Billboard 200-topping soundtracks, Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, which were released after The Beatles arrived.

Mitzi Gaynor, 91, was featured on the South Pacific soundtrack, which topped the chart for 31 nonconsecutive weeks starting in May 1958. Future EGOT recipient Rita Moreno, 91, was featured on the West Side Story soundtrack, which topped the chart for 54 nonconsecutive weeks starting in May 1962. And Anna Maria Alberghetti, 86, was featured on the cast album to Carnival, which topped the chart for a single week in July 1961.

For the record, Billboard published album charts starting in 1945, but the chart didn’t become a regular, weekly feature until March 1956. A total of 51 albums that were credited to an artist topped the chart between Belafonte and The Singing Nun’s The Singing Nun, the final No. 1 of the pre-Beatles era. (Those years officially ended when Meet the Beatles! hit No. 1 on Feb. 15, 1964.)

Here are the four artists who hit No. 1 before that date who are still living: