Don Bustany, radio producer who created the American Top 40 countdown, dies at 89"And now, on with the countdown..."Bustany had been a friend of disc jockey Casey Kasem since childhood, with both growing up in a Lebanese neighborhood in Detroit. In 1970, the two teamed up to create a syndicated radio show that would take
Billboard magazine's list of the most popular songs of the week, order them from 40 to 1, and assemble them into a three-hour program with a few insightful or humorous stories along the way. The end result was
American Top 40, with Kasem as host and Bustany as head writer. The format would go on to be widely adapted (official versions for other formats included
American Country Countdown and
Dick Bartley's American Gold for oldies) and ripped off over the next decades;
AT40 remains on air, with Ryan Seacrest as host.
In addition to his radio work, Bustany also did camera work for MTM Productions. (Particularly in his later years, he did take to activism and hosted a show on the far-left Pacifica network and was a longtime member of the "American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee," a group long suspected of having Islamic terrorist sympathies.)
Obituary by Lee ChambersWikipedia
