The History of Rock and Roll

"The History of Rock and Roll," 1978

1978 promotional poster by Tom Jung
Running time	52 hours
Country of origin	USA
Language(s)	English
Created by	Bill Drake
Written by	Gary Theroux (1978 version) Nicky Wyne, Bill Drake (1981 version)
Directed by	Bill Drake
Executive producer(s)	Bert Kleinman (1978 version) Bill Watson (1981 version)
Narrated by	Bill Drake
Recording studio	Canoga Park, CA
Original release	1978 – present
No. of episodes	52 self-contained hours
Audio format	stereo (except for individual performances originally recorded in mono)
Website

The History of Rock & Roll is a radio documentary on rock and roll music, originally syndicated in 1969. One of the lengthiest documentaries of any medium (48 hours in the 1969 version, 52 hours each for the 1978 and 1981 versions),The History of Rock & Roll is a definitive history of the Rock and Roll genre, stretching from the early 1950s to its day. The "rockumentary," as producers Bill Drake and Gene Chenault called it, features hundreds of interviews and comments from numerous rock artists and people involved with rock and roll.

Notable features introduced in the 1978 edition of this documentary include the "chart sweep," featuring a montage of #1 songs and notable hits from a given year or artist, a "time sweep" for each one-hour segment providing a montage of the major hits for each year or individual artist, and closing with a special climactic time sweep featuring a montage of every #1 hit from 1955 to the year of the latest version.

While the documentary focuses on Rock & Roll and its variants, some songs and artists from other genres are also represented as they also became major hits on stations that primarily played Rock & Roll.

A revised version of the series is currently syndicated to internet networks as a short-form segment hosted by Gary Theroux, writer of the 1978 and 1981 editions.

The History of Rock & Roll first aired on the weekend of February 21–23, 1969 on 93 KHJ Los Angeles, hosted by Robert W. Morgan. It aired for 48 hours and was later syndicated. Later that year, with slight modifications to the script, another version was aired hosted by Humble Harve Miller. The program was then taken to national syndication in the fall of 1969 by parent company RKO General. KHJ repeated this in 12-hour blocks. This version was syndicated throughout the early 1970s, and was sent to stations on large 10 ¹⁄₂" reels of 1/4" tape, in full-track mono. Stations were required to return the tapes immediately after airing, though (surprisingly) several stations offered copies of the show as prizes. The original KHJ show also carried promos awarding copies of the show as prizes to a handful of listeners, on reel-to-reel tape AND a tape recorder to play it on.

Writer Pete Johnson said that "I included nearly every record I ever rem[em]ber hearing".The History of Rock and Roll billed itself as "modern music's first rockumentary" when it first aired on February 21, 1969. However, it had some competition for that title from the Pop Chronicles which began airing on February 9, 1969, on rival Los Angeles AM station KRLA. But since The History of Rock and Roll completed its first broadcast that weekend, it was the first of these rockumentaries to be broadcast in full.