The Recording Industry Association of America added song streams to its Gold & Platinum (G&P) Program in 2013, which helped fuel a record-breaking 663 Digital Single Awards—a 25% increase year-over-year and the most in G&P history.

“In a landmark year for our half-a-century-old Gold & Platinum Program, RIAA added music streams to awards to better recognize artists’ commercial success in a transformative marketplace,” said Cary Sherman, RIAA chairman and CEO. “We’re proud that G&P 2.0 has enabled more musicians than ever to earn their first and highest digital awards.”

Chris Tomlin’s singles “I Will Rise,” from 2008’s Hello Love, and “I Will Follow,” from 2010’s And If Our God Is for Us… (both sixsteprecords/Capitol Christian Distribution) received Gold status in the digital single category. Duck Dynasty’s famous family The Robertsons achieved Platinum status with the hit Christmas album, Duck the Halls (Universal Records Nashville/Capitol Christian Distribution).

Laura Story’s “Blessings” (from the Fair Trade Services/Capitol Christian Distribution album, Blessings) achieved Gold certification in the digital single category, and is her first song to do so. Matt Redman also received his first Gold certification for the hit single “10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord)” from his sixsteprecords/Capitol Christian Distribution album 10,000 Reasons.

Third Day’s 2007 greatest hits albums Chronology Volume One (1996-2000) and Chronology Volume Two (2001-2006) (both Essential Records/Provident Distribution) each received Multi-Platinum status in the video longform category, as the albums are two-disc CD/DVD sets. The Multi-Platinum sales mark for video longform titles is 200,000 copies sold, one-tenth the sales needed for the designation in the album category.

The sales thresholds in the album and digital single categories are 500,000 for Gold, 1 million for Platinum and 2 million for Multi-Platinum.

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