1972 One-Hit Wonder Started as an Advertising Jingle — and Became an Anthem That Defined an Era

In the early 1970s, the song “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing (In Perfect Harmony)” was everywhere. Written by Bill Backer, Billy Davis, Roger Cook, and Roger Greenaway, the song was originally created for a Coca-Cola commercial jingle, and was first performed by the New Seekers for the 1971 ad.

But amid the ad campaign’s success, an alternate version of the song by the Hillside Singers was quickly released as a single, hitting No. 13 on the Billboard charts and making the studio-assembled group a one-hit wonder, according to Songfacts. The New Seekers promptly followed up with a full-length recording of the song and hit No. 7 on Billboard’s Hot 100 in early 1972. The song reached No. 1 on the UK singles chart.

“I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing” was a song about universal peace and harmony. The famous Coca-Cola ad, titled “I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke,” was meant to inspire “unity and happiness,” per the Coca-Cola website. The company noted that more than 50 years later, the song and the campaign have “a lasting connection with the public.” “The commercial has consistently been voted one of the best of all time, and the sheet music continues to sell today,” the beverage company shared.

The  famous song went straight to radio—as a commercial

British songwriter Roger Greenaway opened up about the process of creating the song in an interview with Billboard. He revealed that the song was originally titled “True Love and Apple Pie.” But co-writer Bill Davis didn’t think the lyrics were suitable for the Coke campaign.

Per the Coca-Cola website, Davis reportedly said, “Well, if I could do something for everybody in the world, it would not be to buy them a Coke. …I’d buy everyone a home first and share with them in peace and love.”

Greenaway revealed that the song was then rewritten as “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing” in about six hours.

“After we finished the recording sessions, the commercial went straight to radio — not to TV,” Greenaway recalled to Billboard, noting that the radio ad didn’t get a lot of attention at first. “It wasn’t until a man called Harvey Gabor, who worked in the TV commercial area at McCann, had the idea of filming a group of young men and women of different nationalities and backgrounds standing on a hill with a bottle of Coke in their hand and used ‘Teach the World’ as the anthem that the song took off.”

RELATED: 1976 No. 1 Hit Song Was So Good, a TV Show Was Renamed Before It Was Released

A massive hit

In an essay for Songwriting magazine, Greenaway said everything changed after the TV commercial aired with the singers on the hill.

“The commercial went on air, and within a week of it being on television throughout America, the main office of The Coca-Cola Company in Atlanta had received in excess of 10,000 letters from the public, asking where they might find copies of the music. So they knew they had something special,” he said.

“Billy Davis took [the New Seekers] into the studios one afternoon, to produce the single that went to the top of the charts,” the songwriter added. “Within two nights of it being on television here [in the UK], we were selling 150,000 records a day. It went to No. 1 at Christmas, and it sold a million copies in less than 10 days!”

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