Connie Francis, a major figure in the pop music scene of the 1950s and ’60s known for her sugary tunes, had over a dozen hits during that period. In the months before she passed away, as announced on Thursday, her song “Pretty Little Baby” from six decades ago became a viral sensation on TikTok.

By Thursday, over 22.5 million TikTok clips had been made with the song, often paired with videos of baby animals, toddlers, makeup tutorials, and vintage fashion styles. TikTok reports that these clips have collectively garnered more than 45.5 billion views worldwide. Stars like Kylie Jenner, Kim Kardashian, and North West have also participated, with West even lip-syncing to the track.

Catchy, upbeat pop tunes often succeed on TikTok, and “Pretty Little Baby” from 1962 is a prime example. Users are drawn to the song’s simple innocence and sweet vocals, along with its gentle organ sound and catchy riffs. The lyrics, where Francis expresses her love in whimsical phrases, have especially resonated with the platform’s audience.

And all of this has transpired in mere months: According to Luminate, an industry data and analytics company, “Pretty Little Baby” was earning just over 17,000 on-demand audio streams in the U.S. during the week ending April 10. A month later, that number had climbed to 2.4 million. That’s a growth of over 7,000%. The song has earned over 29 million streams this year so far.

In one popular video, which garnered over 56 million views, a user posted about baby teething hacks for first-time moms. Another user, Amari Goins, posted a video, with over 112 million views, of her 2-year-old daughter singing along to the lyrics, noting that her toddler picked up the song because of how often they heard it on TikTok.

Most recently, TikTok users have begun posting covers of “Pretty Little Baby” as part of a singing challenge, where they exaggerate Francis’ performance with their own stylized vocal runs. Francis, who died at 87, herself joined TikTok as a result of her song’s popularity, and her first two videos — which earned 16.3 million and 31.2 million views, respectively — furthered engagement. In her first video, posted in early June, she said she was “flabbergasted and amazed” at the song’s resurgence.

“To think that a song I recorded 63 years ago is captivating new generations of audiences is truly overwhelming for me,” Francis said in that first post, which she followed with a clip of herself lip-syncing to the song.

For decades, the song lived in relative obscurity — written by Don Stirling and Bill Nauman for Francis, it was never a single and was originally released in the U.K. as the B-side of her 1962 single “I’m Gonna Be Warm This Winter.” It appears on her album “Connie Francis Sings ‘Second Hand Love,’” released the same year. More than 60 years later, the song reached No. 20 on Billboard’s Digital Song Sales chart in June 2025 and hit both the Hot 100’s Bubbling Under chart and the Billboard Global 200.

In Francis’ last TikTok video, posted late last month, she thanked the “many wonderful artists” who paid tribute to her, and all the users who sang along with her.

Peter Lemongello Jr., a singer and performer who called Francis a friend, posted a TikTok in May where he sang the song to Francis, what he wrote on Facebook was “one of the greatest and most exciting moments of my career so far.” The video garnered over 15 million views.

“There are no words to express this monumental loss,” he wrote in a Facebook post on Thursday. “I will be forever grateful to her for the help she gave me with my career.”

Ian Paget, a TikTok creator, posted a tearful video Thursday and said he hopes Francis and her family “have felt that love from the younger crowd learning who she is.”

The TikTok popularity of “Pretty Little Baby” prompted her label Republic/UMe Records to reissue versions Francis had sung in French, German, Italian, Spanish and Swedish in 1962. Bruce Resnikoff, president and CEO of UMe, wrote in a statement that the global catalog division was saddened but took “comfort in knowing how joyful and fulfilled she felt in these last few months, as a new generation discovered her music and celebrated her legacy.”

In May, as the song took off, Francis thanked TikTok and its users for “the wonderful, and oh so unexpected, reception” in a Facebook post.

As for her reaction to having a “viral hit”? She continued: “Clearly out of touch with present day music statistics terminology, my initial response was to ask: ‘What’s that?’ Thank you everyone!”