Adult Standards
Adult standards is a North American radio format that plays classic pop songs from before and around the rock era for older listeners.
The playlist centers on crooners, big band singers and the Great American Songbook, plus easy listening and the softer pop hits of the 1950s to 1970s. Expect orchestras, smooth voices and slow to medium tempos. It is a format, a way of choosing songs for an audience, not a style that musicians set out to play. Its nearest neighbors are traditional pop and easy listening.
Artists it is known for: Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Dean Martin.
- Family
- Pop
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A use, not a style
- From
- United States (radio format)
- Also called
- nostalgia format
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 8%
About 6,500 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have adult standards among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Adult Standards artists
Frank Sinatra
Stevie Wonder
The Jackson 5
Michael Bublé
Nat King Cole
Chet Baker
Ella Fitzgerald
Dean Martin
Etta James
Bing Crosby
The adult standards artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.