The Big Beat is a 1958 American musical comedy film distributed by Universal International, which was directed and produced by Will Cowan, written by David P. Harmon, and starred William Reynolds, Andra Martin, Gogi Grant, and Jeffrey Stone.

[1] The story is about a young man fresh out of college named John Randall who tries to persuade his father, a record company own, to start signing up rock 'n' roll acts.

This film is well known to have featured many famous and popular singers, musicians, and musical groups of the 1950s, including Charlie Barnet, Buddy Bregman, Alan Copeland, The Del-Vikings, and Jeri Southern.

John immediately urges his father to eschew the company's middle-of-the-road love ballads in favor of newer musical genres, such as rock and roll, calypso or rhythm and blues, but Joseph refuses to deviate from the standards.

John then accompanies Cindy to her television show and, after watching her sing, enthusiastically offers the band, a beatnik rock combo called the Preston Trio, an audition at his office.

As stated during the opening credits, "the following artists were chosen for this picture because you.. the public... have acclaimed their talent by purchasing four hundred million of the records": Universal has not officially released The Big Beat on DVD or VHS.