Buena Vista Music Group Dominates Nielsen SoundScan 2006 YTD Current Albums Chart with Three Records in the Top Ten.

High School Musical Soundtrack #1 Best-Selling Album of 2006

BURBANK, Calif. -- Buena Vista Music Group has achieved an unprecedented division best, topping the Nielsen SoundScan 2006 YTD Current Album Chart with the #1 and #2 best-selling records and finishing the year with a total of three albums in the chart's Top Ten. The YTD Current Album Chart for the week ending December 31, 2006 crowns the High School Musical soundtrack #1 (3.7 million units sold) and Rascal Flatts' Me and My Gang #2 (3.4 million units sold), with the Hannah Montana soundtrack securing the #8 position (1.9 million units sold) only 11 weeks after its release.

Bob Cavallo, Buena Vista Music Group Chairman, said, "Obviously, we are very delighted with our recent success, especially since this is a challenging time for the record industry. We are fortunate that Disney Channel afforded us a platform to successfully launch High School Musical and Hannah Montana. And, of course, Rascal Flatts have continued their steady climb with the fourth multi-platinum album in a row."

The year's undisputed phenomenon was Walt Disney Records' soundtrack to the hit Disney Channel Original Movie High School Musical, which the R.I.A.A. has certified triple platinum. Released in January 2006, the High School Musical soundtrack broke multiple sales records on the Billboard charts. The Hot 100 chart included an unprecedented nine original songs from the soundtrack in one week, with six of those singles quickly certifying gold. That same record-breaking week the single "Breaking Free" catapulted from #86 to #4, making the largest jump in the 48-year history of the Billboard Hot 100 Chart. The song's #4 position also made it Walt Disney Records' highest-ranked Hot 100 song in the label's 50-year history. The gold single "Get'cha Head in the Game" also broke a 34-year-old Billboard record by soaring from #100 to #28 - the largest jump ever from the anchor position. In March 2006, High School Musical became the first television soundtrack in two decades to helm the Billboard Top 200.

Rascal Flatts' fourth album, Me And My Gang, was released by Lyric Street Records in April and opened with 722,000 units sold first week, making it the highest debut of 2006. Me and My Gang quickly certified triple platinum for sales of more than three million units and is the second best selling album of the year across all genres. In 2006, Rascal Flatts achieved its first crossover #1 hit when the single "What Hurts The Most" topped both the country and AC radio charts. The award-winning country music superstars recently became the first group in history to be named both the #1 Billboard Top 200 Artist of the Year and the #1 Country Artist of the Year by Billboard Magazine.

Walt Disney Records' soundtrack to the hit Disney Channel Original Series Hannah Montana became the music group's third album to top the charts in 2006 and was the first-ever TV soundtrack to enter Billboard's Top 200 chart at #1. The album held the pole position for 2 consecutive weeks and broke Billboard records by charting seven tracks on the Hot 100 Singles, the most by a single artist in one week in the history of the chart. Hannah Montana recently certified double platinum, earning the #8 spot on Nielsen SoundScan's 2006 YTD Current Album Chart only two months after its release.

The Buena Vista Music Group encompasses all of the Walt Disney Studio's recorded music and music publishing operations, including Hollywood Records, Walt Disney Records, Lyric Street Records and Walt Disney Music Publishing.