As many of you know, I started my career in music, radio and retail, I was truly blessed to be one of the very first female Music Directors in Canadian history and I still thank the people in the business who had the foresight to see past the fact I was a woman, and was a person who was passionate about music.

That passion for music has never left me and heading into our 14th year of Cashbox Canada, a magazine inspired by the legendary Cashbox Magazine, we are now working hard to bring back radio to where it used to be with our latest venture, Cashbox Radio.

A little history of where the name Cashbox came from - the name of Cashbox Magazine (originally two words – Cash Box) was named after the actual ‘cash box’ inside the jukeboxes of America. When customers put their money in and played for example - A1, the money dropped down into a specific spot in the cash box and this is how the original Cash Box Charts were derived from collecting that information. 

When radio was a little more friendly; back in the day, an artist could go visit a Music Director to play them their latest release. Wednesdays were considered ‘radio days’, a day that was open to the many characters who were the guys we called promo reps, who came to the stations to promote and push the music their label represented.  Those guys were the ones who actually were responsible for breaking a record.

The other tool we had was music trade magazines. In Canada, we used RPM Magazine and Record Week and the US magazines influenced us all. Billboard, Radio and Records, Record World and of course, Cashbox Magazine. 

Cashbox Magazine had many trailblazing ideas about charts, they had categories and genres but they also had a Looking Ahead Chart and a song would also have the asterisk “with a bullet” (not appropriate in today’s current climate) which meant a song had a fast-rising spot on the charts.

With the launch of our latest venture, cashboxradio.ca, we have brought back one of those legendary charts, The Cashbox Top 20 Pick Hits – a monthly chart adjudicated by our radio hosts Don Graham, Paul Saunders, Grace Puluczek, Station Manager Peter Astedt and myself, Program Director Sandy Graham.

We launched the comeback of the Top 20 Pick Hit Chart March 1st, 2020 and in a few short months it has become an established tool for artists to use for proof of airplay and promotional purposes and in some countries, grant applications.

In the forward-thinking of this station, which lets the radio hosts be their own Music Directors, The Cashbox Top 20 Pick Hits will be something of value to the artists as we move towards making it an important way to get their music out there.

The other thing about The Cashbox Top 20 Pick Hits is the music is global; we have artists from parts of Europe, Spain, Canada, Sweden and the USA. We have Indie artists right up there with legendary and hit artists. "Radio the Way It Used to Be." You can go and listen to the Top 20 Pick Hits here: cashboxradio.ca/top20-pick-hits/

I am extremely proud of the Cashbox Team, both with the magazine and the radio station, because for us it is still truly all about the music.

So please listen to our station @ cashboxradio.ca or on the FREE app on your phone available on phone iPhones and Androids.

Check out the new October Top 20 Pick Hit Chart for Cashbox Radio and support the artists.