Billy Gilman shot onto the country scene in 2000 with two big hits on my Top 30 Country Songs: One Voice which peaked at #2 and Oklahoma which went to #1 and both songs charted on my Top 40. At the end of the year he released the requisite Christmas album, Classic Christmas, featuring the hit, Warm And Fuzzy, which peaked at #14 on the Top 30 Country Songs this year. His sophmore album, Dare To Dream, produced the number one, She's My Girl, and Elisabeth, which was at #3 the last week of 2001. All three of these albums are in the year's list of top country albums. Classic Christmas is at #6, Dare To Dream at #3, and One Voice is the Number One Country Album of 2001. One Voice has sold over two million copies which by country standards is huge not to mention it was his first album and he is only thirteen years old!
It was difficult to determine what constitutes a new artist on this chart. For example, South 65 released an album in 1998 but I don't think it saw much exposure plus I had never charted them before this year. Therefore, I judged they were a new artist in 2001 and as result they are the Top Country New Artist of the Year. They spent five weeks at number one with a cover of Charlie Rich's 1973 hit, The Most Beautiful Girl, and their followup, One Moment, also went top ten. However, over on the Top 20 County Groups they end up at #2 as Brooks And Dunn is the Top Country Group of the Year. They attain that on the strength of three top ten songs in 2001: Ain't Nothing 'Bout You peaked at #2, Only In America and The Long Goodbye both peaked at #10, all from their latest hit album, Steers And Stripes.
