RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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See the full story · 1 sourcesBertie Higgins was panicking the week of Nov. 21, 1981.
He had every reason to celebrate: He was in his second week on the Billboard Hot 100 with “Key Largo,” which had debuted the week before at No. 86.
Despite then rising to No. 82, it “lost the bullet,” Higgins remembers, chatting with Billboard from his home in Florida, around 30 miles north of Tampa.
By week three, the song regained its bullet, reflecting its more significant gain, and the song was off and running (or, sailing) to a No. 8 peak for two weeks in April 1982.
Dread had been replaced by dominance. “When it made it into the AC chart” — where it led for three weeks — “that was a great time in my life,” Higgins says.
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On the latest Billboard Adult Contemporary chart (dated Aug. 1, 2026), the singer-songwriter, 81, debuts with his new single “A River” at No. 29 — his first time on the ranking in more than 42 years. After “Key Largo,” he charted with “Just Another Day in Paradise,” which reached No. 10 in June 1982, and “When You Fall in Love,” a No. 34 hit in January 1984.
After years of productive writing, recording and touring globally, Higgins marvels at his longevity, appearing on a chart that has recently included four Taylor Swift songs in the top 10. “To compete with that, that’s amazing,” he says. “God bless her.”
Higgins cowrote “A River,” released on Toucan Cove, with Eddie Hedges and says that, as throughout his career, “My main thrust is my songwriting. ‘A River’ came from a unique spot, from the movie Lawrence of Arabia .” In the 1962 classic, the sheikh character played by Anthony Quinn says, per Higgins’ paraphrasing, “‘I’m a river to my people — everything I have goes to them.’
“As a songwriter, I’m tuned in to every street sign, things that people mumble about that I can barely understand, so I’ve got my brain out there for all this material,” Higgins says. “So I wrote ‘A River’ — ‘her love flows like a river into my heart’ — which I thought was a good idea. It’s amazing where you get your inspiration from.”
Higgins feels that the parallels of “A River” and “Key Largo,” which takes its title from the 1948 film of the same name starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, as shouted out in its earworm chorus, are owed in part to his love of “those older movies.”
Plus, “My wife and I used to go down to the Florida Keys a lot. I’m a Florida boy. I’m from Tampa Bay in a little fishing village called Tarpon Springs. I was a sponge diver for a while. That was a great eye-opening, difficult gig. Good lord, those guys worked hard. I’ve seen everything you can see in the salt water out here in the gulf. My father taught me all about fishing.”
Further sparking his signature hit, which Higgins cowrote with Sonny Limbo and coproduced with Limbo and Scott MacLellan, “I mean, my wife and I really liked that film a lot, and we split up for a while before we got married, and I really missed her. That’s when I wrote ‘Key Largo,’ ” he notes.
Did he know it would become a classic?
“My publisher in Atlanta, Bill Lowery … great ears … said, ‘Lad, if this damn thing ever gets legs, it’ll live forever.’ And he’s been so right — that song won’t go away. The song had an amazing run and it still is running.”
To date, “Key Largo” has drawn 74.3 million official U.S. streams and 45 million in radio airplay audience, while selling 243,000 downloads, according to Luminate.
Early in his career, Higgins played with the likes of The Beach Boys and The Rolling Stones. Beach Boy Bruce Johnston “became a good friend of mine,” he says, while late Stones drummer Charlie Watts “was the best … a friendly guy.”
Higgins advises newer artists to “follow your mentors and always surround yourself with winners. If you’re smart enough, you’ll listen to the peers around you who’ve been successful.”
Also: “Never try to make it into the charts out of Tarpon Springs. I had to go to Atlanta. I mean, the chances of a major producer walking into some honky-tonk you’re playing are slim and none. Get in the middle of the fray. Go to L.A., New York, Hollywood and get in the middle of the craziness and compete.
“And just write every day if you’re a writer,” Higgins says. “No matter whether it’s a folk or a honky-tonk song, blues, just write it down, because you never know who’s going to pick it up.”
Looking back on his career, Higgins remains astounded at some of its highs, including being knighted . “I got the sword hanging on my living room wall, along with a bunch of Gold and Platinum albums,” he says proudly. (How did he learn of receiving the honor from England? “Someone approached me, and I said, ‘Why not? I’ve never met a knight.’ ”) And I got an honorary PhD in music from Germany.
“I’ll lay in bed at night and go, ‘Did that really happen to me?’ ”
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