28 Feb 2023

Chart Rewind: In 1998, Celine Dion’s ‘My Heart Will Go On’ Hit No. 1 on the Hot 100 (See Full Top 10)

“I decided that the only thing that could culminate this film was something that [brings together] all the emotions,” Titanic composer James Horner told then-Billboard radio editor Chuck Taylor in 1998.

“I wanted to write a song that would allow a contemporary legitimacy, so that it wouldn’t be just a period piece,” Horner mused.

On the Billboard Hot 100 dated Feb. 28, 1998, Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On,” which Horner completed writing with Will Jennings to close the 1912 (and 1997)-set Titanic, crowned the Hot 100. It debuted at No. 1 as it spent its fifth week atop the Radio Songs chart and arrived as the week’s best-selling song, newly released as a limited-edition stand-alone single.

On the Billboard 200, the Titanic soundtrack, featuring the ballad, scored its sixth week at No. 1, of 16 total weeks on top.

Notably, James Cameron, who solely wrote and directed Titanic, had originally forbidden that the film’s end-credits song include vocals. Horner, however, ultimately decided that he wanted a song to contrast the movie’s orchestral arrangements. As for the vocalist, “I needed an opera singer more than pop singer to bring all the emotional qualities I wanted,” Horner told Billboard. “For me, the only person that could do that was Celine. It was casting more than it was trying to find a superstar to sing it.”

Taylor’s story (which ran the week that “Heart” hit No. 1 on the Hot 100) continued tracing the steps that the song took to its lasting legacy: Horner surreptitiously met with Dion and her husband René Angélil, as he had long known the couple, and played a demo. Impressed, Dion likewise fell for Titanic following a private screening, taken by the film’s love story.

Five weeks later, she recorded it. “It was just electrifying,” Horner recalled. “She was singing like her life depended on it.”

Horner finally took the song to Cameron. “I was waiting for an especially good mood,” Horner said. “On one occasion, he was really excited about a special effect that had just been completed. I was sweating, but I played it.” Cameron’s reaction? “He couldn’t believe it. He said, ‘Aren’t those your themes?’ This is Celine Dion. How did you do this?’ He did love it.”

How did the rest of the Hot 100’s top 10 stack up the week that Dion hit No. 1 on the Feb. 28, 1998, chart? Count down the tally’s top tier that week below, along with a look at more honors that “Heart” has since achieved.

“Been Around the World,” Puff Daddy & The Family (feat. The Notorious B.I.G. & Mase)

Image Credit: Marvin Joseph/The The Washington Post via GI

The all-star song spent its 12th and last week in the Hot 100’s top 10 on the Feb. 28, 1998-dated chart, down 5-10 after peaking at No. 2 for three weeks. From Puff Daddy & The Family’s introductory album No Way Out, it also brought two prior hits back to the chart’s upper reaches, as it samples David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance” and interpolates Lisa Stansfield’s “All Around the World.” The former led for a week in 1983 and the latter hit No. 3 in 1990.
“No, No, No,” Destiny’s Child

Image Credit: Vinnie Zuffante/Michael Ochs Archives/GI

The first Hot 100 hit for Destiny’s Child – then comprising Beyoncé, LeToya Luckett, LaTavia Roberson and Kelly Rowland – retreated 8-9 on the Feb. 28-dated list but rebounded to reach No. 3 a month later. The song marked the act’s first of 10 top 10s and helped set Beyoncé on the path to solo superstardom: She has since scored 21 solo top 10s, becoming the first woman with at least 20 solo top 10s and 10 as a member of a group. Overall, only Paul McCartney/The Beatles and Michael Jackson/the Jacksons are also in the exclusive club.
“A Song for Mama,” Boyz II Men

Image Credit: Steve Granitz/WireImage

Boyz II Men boasted the most Hot 100 top 10s among groups, or any male act, during the ’90s, with 10. This song marked their 10th, and most recent, descending to No. 8 from its No. 7 best on the Feb. 28 chart. Half of their top 10s hit No. 1, from “End of the Road” in 1992 through “4 Seasons of Loneliness” in 1997, and their 50 total weeks on top are fifth-best all-time, after only Mariah Carey (91), Rihanna (60), The Beatles (59) and Drake (54).
“I Don’t Ever Want To See You Again,” Uncle Sam

Image Credit: Dave Hogan/GI

Smith and Dion combined for an unprecedented achievement in the Feb. 28-dated Hot 100’s top three: As his track launched at No. 3 and “My Heart Will Go On” soared in at No. 1, two songs debuted in the top three together for the first time in the chart’s then-almost-40-year archives.

“Jiggy,” Smith’s first solo Hot 100 hit, after eight as (the second) half of D.J. Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince, went on to dethrone “Heart” after two weeks on top for a three-week reign of its own.

Meanwhile, the song’s title (mostly) received a synch in the 1997-98 TV’s season’s top series, although did Smith or Jerry Seinfeld, or anyone else, first coin the term? What’s the deal with that?
“Nice & Slow,” Usher

Image Credit: Robert A. Reeder/The The Washington Post via GI

The seductive song fell to No. 2 on the Feb. 28 Hot 100 after two weeks at No. 1 – having become Usher’s first leader on the chart dated, fittingly, Feb. 14.

Usher has since upped his count to nine Hot 100 No. 1s, tied with Elton John and Paul McCartney for the fourth-most among solo males, after only Michael Jackson (13), Drake (11) and Stevie Wonder (10).

In 2021, Usher chatted with Billboard ahead of his first Las Vegas residency (in a backstage suite that Gail Mitchell, executive editor, R&B/hip-hop, noted was originally built for none other than Celine Dion). “I would call myself ‘seasoned’ more than ‘elder statesman.’ I’m feeling like I’m about 18 right now — in terms of passion, not wisdom,” he said with a laugh. (He was then 42.) “There’s a playful nature that I think is coming back. I actually feel like I’m having fun.

“It’s not easy to sustain a career,” he continued, “but there are artists who have managed to do it and have been here for some time: Beyoncé. Alicia Keys. Justin Timberlake. Janet Jackson. I just hope I’m in that same category. But it hasn’t changed my ability to embrace new artists coming up. I definitely understand the reality, and the idea, of embracing [the] new.”
“My Heart Will Go On,” Celine Dion

Image Credit: ROBERT LABERGE/AFP via GI

“Being a part of a classic is a very big, big honor,” Dion told Billboard backstage after performing the song for its 20th anniversary at the 2017 Billboard Music Awards.

The song won the Oscar for best original song, awarded to Horner (who passed in 2015) and Jennings, who composed the music and wrote the lyrics, respectively. It also won at the Grammy Awards for, among its four victories, record and song of the year.

“Heart” has drawn 5 billion in cumulative airplay audience and 728 million official U.S. streams, according to Luminate. The Titanic soundtrack has sold 10.2 million copies in the U.S., while Titanic has grossed $2.2 billion at the box office worldwide, the fourth-best total in cinema history. The film is currently in theaters, in 4K 3D, in honor of its 25th anniversary.

For Dion, “Heart,” released on Sony’s 550 Music label, and distributed by Epic Records, marked her third of four Hot 100 No. 1s, among 10 top 10s. The song was also released on her album Let’s Talk About Love, which became her second of five No. 1s on the Billboard 200. She most recently led the list with Courage in 2019.

Notably, as Taylor’s 1998 reporting further chronicled, “Heart” started slowly at radio – until Titanic premiered. On Radio Songs, at that point, “it exploded like popcorn,” he wrote, “catapulting to No. 39, then 18 to 4 to No. 1.”

“There’s a power that movies have,” then-550 senior vp of promotion Hilary Shaev said. “That alone can make a song seem really big and really special. But I don’t think that’s why [“Heart”] is a hit. I think it was destined to be so from the start.”